


The Secret to Dancing

by NephilimEQ



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Ballroom Dancing, Complete, Dancing Lessons, Emotional Constipation, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Idiots in Love, M/M, Miscommunication, Mutual Pining, Pining John Sheppard, Slow Dancing, Wedding Planning, everyone knows but them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-07-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:47:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25599040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NephilimEQ/pseuds/NephilimEQ
Summary: “Fine. Will you teach me to dance?” “No.” “What?!”Or, also known as the story where John knows how to dance and Rodney wants John to show him how so that he can dance with Keller when they get married, and John ends up in his own personal hell. Or is it just what he needs to realize that he isn't ready to let Rodney go?
Relationships: Rodney McKay/John Sheppard
Comments: 26
Kudos: 92
Collections: McShep Big Bang 2020





	The Secret to Dancing

**Author's Note:**

> I would really advise listening to Johnny Cash's cover of "In My Life", because I feel it is really the perfect song for the two of them.

** The Secret to Dancing **

John barely looked up from his book as McKay barged into his quarters unannounced. _Stupid ATA gene,_ he thought to himself as the man made more noise than was strictly necessary to walk into a room. It made the scientist act as if he was entitled, even more so than usual.

“Sheppard, I need your help.”

John turned a page.

“Really,” he replied dryly. “With what, exactly?”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Rodney start to pace, wringing his hands and biting his lip, a sign that usually meant that he was out of his depth on something, and John perked up at that. Oh, so it was serious. And he was asking for _his_ help. Well, whatever it was, it was certain to at least be amusing.

He slowly put down his book as Rodney replied, “Well, the wedding is coming up…” John winced. “And I have a…pressing problem.”

John sat up all the way, slid his book to the side, and asked, “What kind of problem?”

Rodney stopped pacing and faced him.

“If I tell you, do you promise not to laugh or ridicule me in any way?”

John nodded.

“Yeah, of course.”

The scientist took a deep breath and slowly let it out, as if bracing himself for delivering bad news. Finally, after a long, uncomfortable pause, he admitted, “I don’t know how to dance.”

John just shrugged, barely reacting to what he thought wasn’t that big of a deal. “So, you can’t dance. What’s the big deal?” he voiced out loud, and Rodney shot him a guilty look and John immediately knew what was going on. “You told Jennifer you _could_ dance, didn’t you?” he accused, and his friend guiltily nodded.

“Yeah. I, uh…sorta did. And I might’ve, you know…over-exaggerated my skills and prowess on the dance floor by a teensy bit.”

“’Teensy’ meaning you told her you’ve been dancing ballroom since you were six.” Rodney nodded. “Of course, you did,” drawled John, slowly standing and giving his friend a look, one eyebrow arched. Rodney gave him his usual apologetic look, one that Sheppard was very familiar with…and then it occurred to John to finally ask, “Why’d you come _here_?”

Rodney looked down at his feet and then looked back up.

“Uh, I was hoping that you…you know…might…help me?”

John gave him another look, his brow furrowing, and then his eyes widened.

“Who told you?” he shot out, pointing an accusing finger.

“Teyla, but don’t blame her!” Rodney quickly replied, waving one of his hands out in front of him. “I asked and she said something on accident! All I know is that I have six months until the wedding--” John winced again. “--And I need to be able to impress Jennifer by then. So…will you?”

John glared at him.

“You know, you haven’t actually _asked_ me anything…”

Rodney rolled his eyes.

“Fine. Will you teach me to dance?”

“No.”

“What?!”

John rolled his eyes that time, walking towards his bookcase, shoving his copy of War and Peace onto the top shelf as he repeated, “No. Not happening.”

At this, Rodney let out a sound of frustration.

“What? Why?”

John gave him a withering look and snapped, “You dug yourself into this hole, you can get yourself out of it, too, McKay. I’m not helping you cover up for your own mistakes…”

“But that’s what I’m trying to _do!_ ” the scientist exclaimed, gesturing wildly. “Why _else_ would I be here, prostrating myself at your feet, asking you to do this? It’s humiliating,” he added, looking down at his feet and shoving his hands into his pockets.

John rolled his eyes.

“If it’s so humiliating, then why are you asking me? Also, I’m not seeing any prostrating, here…”

Rodney gave him a less than convincing glare but said nothing.

John rolled his eyes and walked out of the room.

\--

Two weeks later, Rodney was still dogging his steps. Even as they walked through the gate to PX-941, the scientist barely took a breath, saying, “Do you _want_ me to look like a total idiot at my own wedding?”

Personally, John was perfectly fine with that situation, but instead he replied, “Of course not, McKay, but can we not talk about this now?”, and scanned nervous eyes around the perimeter, trying to make sure that they weren’t about to be ambushed. With the sound Rodney was making, someone could have snuck up on them by now. Also, he didn’t want someone overhearing the subject of their conversation. The fact that he was classically trained in ballroom dancing was a very well-hidden secret, and it wouldn’t do him any favors to have his fellow soldiers find out about it. The only reason Teyla knew about it was because she had asked him what a foxtrot was…and he _might’ve_ gone into too much detail, revealing his actual abilities.

He swiveled his head, looking out for any signs of danger as Rodney rambled on behind him, his gun only barely raised. John held in a groan and trudged on.

By the time they made it back from their trip (during which nothing eventful had happened), he caved.

“Fine!” he yelled at him as he marched down the hall towards his quarters, murder in the back of his mind as the scientist followed him. Rodney suddenly stopped in the middle of the hallway and looked at him in shock, as if he’d never expected him to say yes.

“Wait…you mean you’ll do it?” he said, his tone of voice as incredulous as his expression.

John bit back the smart retort he wanted to fire at him, but instead rolled his eyes at him and said, “Yes. That is what ‘fine’ means, isn’t it? You’ve been driving me crazy and I honestly don’t know how much more of this I can take before I end up strangling you in your sleep!”

McKay looked slightly abashed at that point, but then made it worse by asking, “Are you saying yes because you actually _want_ to help me, or because you just want me to stop asking?”

John ground his back teeth.

“Do you _really_ want me to answer that?”

“Uh…probably not,” Rodney admitted. He turned as if to leave, but then said in an unexpectedly soft voice over his shoulder, “Thank you, John.”

He didn’t know what to say, so he simply said, “No problem.”

\--

John checked the corridor outside the empty room one last time. If he was going to do this, then there weren’t going to be any witnesses.

His paranoia was broken by Rodney whining behind him, “Oh, c’mon. Are you going to teach me or not?”

“I’m still considering leaving you to fend for yourself,” John snapped back at him, but his actions said the opposite as he walked confidently to the center of the room, one hand on the scientist’s wrist, dragging him reluctantly behind him, determined to get everything over with as quickly as possible.

Without even thinking about it (because he knew if he did, he _would_ change his mind), he put his left hand on Rodney’s shoulder and moved the younger man’s right hand to his waist.

Rodney looked up at him in confusion and hesitantly inquired, “Uh, don’t we need music for this sort of thing? I mean, I’m no expert,” he quickly backtracked, “But since dancing is done to music, I was sort of assuming that there would be, you know…music. Is this--”

John cut him off with, “McKay. If you wanna learn this, shut up.”

He did.

“Now,” John continued, a bit more cordially, “The secret to doing it right is to learn the steps before you add the music. So, use a little bit of pressure on my waist and step forward with your right foot…” He did. “…Follow with your left and move it left, and then feet together.” He did. “Okay, now left foot to the back…” He moved and John followed. “And follow with the right foot to the right and bring both feet together…”

Rodney did it without faltering and John smiled, despite himself.

“Good. You just learned the box-step.”

Rodney looked up at him, as his eyes had been trained down at his feet the entire time.

“Seriously?” Sheppard gave him a look. “Oh, well, that wasn’t too hard.”

John laughed at that and said, “Oh, you’re barely getting started, McKay. Trust me. It’s only gonna get harder.”

Rodney gulped and John grinned. It just might be more fun than he realized. He made the scientist go through it several more times, until he was able to do it at least ten times without having to look at his feet, and then John walked over to the small stereo he’d snuck in from his room and put on some classical music that was easy to keep time with. Strauss. One of his lighter pieces, of course; The Blue Danube Waltz, the slow tempo version. That was how _he’d_ learned, after all.

“Now,” he said walking back up to him and taking the woman’s position once more. “With the music.”

Rodney looked slightly panicked, and John reassured him with, “I’ll count us off, alright? One…two…three…one…two…three…one…and…now…”

He shakily started off, while Sheppard continued to prompt him to remember what he’d just learned only minutes before. There was some stubbing of toes at first…and then Rodney seemed to find some confidence, because his fingers tightened on John’s hip and he started to subtly steer him with his body, and didn’t even seem to realize that he was moving him in a circle around the room.

John smiled to himself, as Rodney seemed lost in his head, and then John noticed him counting under his breath.

“One, two, three, one, two, three, and turn right, and turn left here-two-three…”

He tried not to snort.

The music finally died down and then McKay stood there looking awkward, holding John’s hand in the air, dropping the other one from his waist.

“Uh…now what do I do?”

John’s eyebrow shot up and couldn’t help but tease, “Well, normally you’d kiss her hand at this point and lead her off the floor to a romantic rendezvous…”

At that, the scientist dropped his hand as if he’d been burned and rubbed it on his thigh and said, “Well, since that’s not going to happen, how about we meet again same time next week?” John snorted, unable to keep it in. “Oh, what? What do you find so amusing about that, Sheppard?”

“I find it amusing that you think that that’s how long a lesson lasts. We’ve got an hour and a half to go, McKay. So, settle in and make yourself comfortable.”

He turned the music off and Rodney groaned.

Yes. This was going to be fun.

As they started back up again, eventually with music, John noticed after about forty-five minutes that Rodney was finally sinking into it and not counting out loud anymore, and so he couldn’t help but ask (as sarcastically as possible, of course), “Why so quiet, McKay? Trying to actually get on my good side for once, or are you just losing your capacity for speech?”

That earned him an eyeroll and a hearty, “Oh, ha, ha, Sheppard, you’re a riot. No, none of the above. For your information, I used to play piano, and I was reminding myself of the tempo for this piece and realized that you’re playing a much slower version of Opus 314 by Strauss. You don’t have to treat me with kid gloves, Colonel,” he added almost mockingly as he turned him effortlessly into a tight circle, arching an eyebrow at him. “I’m fairly certain that I can do this one at tempo, by now.”

John snorted and pulled back, effectively ending their dance and snapped back, “Ego will get you _no_ where in dancing, McKay. And this is the Blue Danube Waltz, not Opus 314,” he added, waving a hand at him, and this time Rodney’s look turned into a glare.

“Opus 314 is the original name of the Blue Danube Waltz, you putz,” he snipped. “It’s only called that because Strauss based the piece he wrote off of a poem by Karl Isidor Beck, which is incredibly ironic, if you think about it, because the Danube at the time was very much _not_ blue. In fact, people hated his first version of it, and it only became popular when they heard it in orchestral form.”

John stared at him, completely unsure of what to do with that information, and then finally said, “O..kay. Not exactly information I can do anything with, but okay. Nice to know.”

Rodney let out a frustrated sigh and explained.

“Sorry, it’s just…classical music and I don’t exactly have the best relationship, and I know that Jennifer is going to want to dance to nothing _but_ classical at the wedding, something about keeping it classy and easy for everyone, and so I kind of just have to…you know…get over it. Getting lessons from you is like killing two birds with one stone. Which, I understand, is a horrible metaphor to use in regard to one’s wedding, but it’s all I can think of at the moment, because the whole wedding planning thing is stressing me out and--”

“Rodney!” John cut him off. He looked up. “Take a breath.” He did, and John asked, “Now, first of all, how come you’ve never mentioned before that you used to play piano?”

The scientist shrugged, ducked his hands, and then shoved his hands into his pockets.

“Uh, well…they’re not exactly the best memories,” he softly admitted. “When I was twelve, after years of playing, mind you, my teacher told me to stop playing and forget my dreams of ever becoming a concert pianist. He said I was a fine, clinical player, had all the technique down, but no sense of the art, whatsoever.” He went a little bit quiet and then added, “I used to love classical music, hell, anything I could play on piano, I was a bit obsessed over it, naturally, but after that…well, I turned to science. Safer, you know? The art of science is to get used to being wrong until you’re right.”

John didn’t say anything to that, but he had a sudden insight to Rodney with that one sentence. No wonder Rodney seemed so…cagey. The last time he’d loved something, he’d been told that he didn’t love it enough to be any good at it. Huh.

John swallowed and then said, “Well, we don’t have to dance to classical, it’s just easier to get my hands on that kind of music, here. A lot of you scientists have scarily similar tastes in music,” he added, shooting a look over at him as he switched to another song. “Especially the mathematicians.”

Rodney shrugged.

“Yeah, the math guys like that stuff,” he muttered, looking unsure of what to do with his hands, and then he shoved them into the pockets of his uniform pants. “So, what else are you going to teach me during this lesson?”

John shrugged this time.

“Uh, I don’t really know. I’ve never taught a dance class, before,” he reluctantly admitted, and then gave him an amused look as he said, “But I have a feeling that no one’s ever had a student as challenging as you, so it’s gonna be interesting, to say the least.”

At that, Rodney didn’t try to defend himself, he just chuckled and said, “Yeah, well, I’ve always been told that I was an impossible pupil, so nothing new there.”

John snorted and shook his head.

He truly had his work cut out for him.

\--

Six weeks later, John was nervous as hell. He had hoped that Rodney would be a slow learner. Hell, he’d prayed for it, because he knew Rodney was less than coordinated when it came to physical endeavors, but, of course, dancing had to be the _one_ exception, because he was the complete _opposite_ of a slow learner. In fact, he was getting remarkably good at it for such a short amount of practice. The only way that John could rationalize it was the fact that dancing had to be done in the mind before anything else, and Rodney was certainly not lacking in mental capacity, that much was for sure, and it was coupled with the fact that he used to play piano, so he had more than a decent sense of rhythm.

They had only been meeting three times a week in the evenings (covertly and with comms off), for about an hour each time at a time that no one would notice them absent, and had worked their way up from the waltz, lindy hop, and basic swing, all the way up to the foxtrot; and now, they were starting salsa.

Dammit.

He had been hoping to avoid the close contact dances for another month. No such luck.

“So,” said the younger scientist, clapping and rubbing his hands together, looking all too eager and confident. “What are we learning today?”

“We? _You_ are going to be starting with the salsa,” he corrected him, avoiding eye contact and pressing a button on the small stereo he’d smuggled from Zelenka’s desk. His had crapped out two days before. Probably from overuse. Unlike other dances, you had to hear and feel the music in order to do the salsa properly.

Rodney suddenly looked less confident and slightly wary.

“The salsa? Really? Uh, doesn’t that involve a lot of, uh…touching?”

Sheppard snorted.

“ _All_ dancing requires touching, McKay.”

Rodney rolled his eyes and retorted, “You know what I mean, Sheppard. It involves… _more_ touching than you normally…have to…oh, you know what I mean,” he repeated, shoving his hands into his pockets, looking irritated.

John half-smiled at that (more of a grimace, really), and turned to the right track. Number six. Okay. He set it up on repeat and then turned to Rodney, mimicking his motions from earlier, rubbing his hands together, mentally psyching himself up for what he was about to do.

“Okay, this is gonna be a little more…intimate,” John said carefully, stepping into the scientist’s personal space more than he was used to. He noticed Rodney stiffen up as he placed Rodney’s right hand firmly over his left shoulder blade, elbow sticking out. Even his fingers were tense. “Jeez, Rodney, you gotta relax,” the older man insisted, rolling his shoulder, feeling his fingers lighten up, the rest of him still tense. “Remember? Level knees, loose hips…” He tapped his fingers to the inside of Rodney’s left hip, and the younger man glared at him.

“That’s easy for _you_ to say!” Rodney quipped. “You’re not the one making a fool of yourself…”

At that, the soldier raised an eyebrow and said curiously, “What’s the matter? You’ve been fine the last month we’ve been doing this. Why’s this so different?”

As he positioned himself closer, he saw Rodney swallow, and then he hesitantly answered, “I have issues with…personal space. This is, uh, closer than I’m comfortable with. It’s, uh…a sensory thing.”

John didn’t think of much of what he just said, and instead adjusted Rodney’s stance, nudging his foot against Rodney’s, fixing his balance, and muttered distractedly, “Yeah, well, if it makes you so uncomfortable, then pretend that I’m Keller.”

Rodney swallowed again.

“Actually, that only makes it worse.”

 _That_ caught Sheppard’s attention. He looked back up at his friend, trying to figure out what exactly he’d meant by that. He opened his mouth, about to ask him about it…and then changed his mind at the last second. No. Better not to ask. He had a feeling that was a can of worms that he shouldn’t open.

Instead, he proceeded to show the beginning steps to the salsa, the entire time deliberately ignoring his body’s natural reaction to Rodney’s warmth. Again, the scientist took to it fairly quickly, even breaking into that stupid, smug grin of his when John commented on his solid footwork, forcing John to then correct him on something else immediately afterwards, not wanting Rodney to feel like he had the upper hand at any point during his instruction.

Just as they reached the tail end of the lesson, Rodney moved his feet in a little too far, causing John to lose his balance as he tripped over them…but he was suddenly caught by Rodney pulling him straight against him.

“Oh, god, sorry! I’m such an idiot,” Rodney apologized, which was a miracle, but John barely noticed as the younger man’s breath brushed against John’s ear, causing parts of his brain to shut down, including that of coherent speech, apparently, as he brokenly replied, “Uh, yeah, it’s not…you’re…fine. Fine. Not your fault,” he finally managed out. “You’re doing great, McKay.”

Their faces were maybe an inch apart at the most.

Rodney swallowed…

...and then a cough from the doorway had them bolting apart from each other as if struck by lightning.

It was Teyla.

She looked at the two of them, where they were both purposely avoiding looking at each other, and said, “Dr. McKay. Colonel Sheppard. It seems one of the SGA teams is several hours late for their check-in. Woolsey sent a few of us to find you as your comms don’t seem to be working.” She paused a long time, during which the salsa music blared, so John walked over and turned it off, making the silence even more uncomfortable, until Teyla cautiously inquired, “Were you two…dancing?”

Rodney flushed a deep red, but John quickly spoke up as he handed Rodney back his comm and put his back on and explained, “I’m teaching him to dance. For the wedding.”

The scientist’s eyes snapped up and over to Sheppard’s, looking as if he was ready to murder him, but before he could say anything, Teyla said, “Oh. That’s all?”, and the light look in her eyes left, instead replaced with something akin to disappointment. She pulled back from the door and added, “Woolsey wants us to go and check on them, to see if something happened…”

John nodded, and then asked, “Wait…was it SGA18?” She nodded. He let out an aggravated sigh. “Spencer. Of course. That man has the worst sense of direction, and I am certain that he got lost…like someone _else_ I know,” he slyly added, casting an amused glance in Rodney’s direction.

Rodney scoffed.

“Excuse me, but I do _not_ have a lousy sense of direction, Sheppard!”

“You sure about that, McKay?”

The scientist gave him a look, one eyebrow arched and retorted, “According to you over the last few weeks, my sense of direction is _impeccable_ …”

John coughed, and Teyla smiled fondly at the both of them and said, “Be that as it may, Woolsey is asking for you.”

They nodded and followed her down the corridor…until Rodney suddenly stopped and asked, “Hold on a second…we didn’t have our comms on, so how’d you know where to find us?”

She gave both of them a sly look and then smirked as she pulled ahead of them to the transporter.

“You two have been disappearing at the same time, three times a week for the past six weeks and you thought no one noticed?” Rodney blanched, and she let out a small laugh, obviously amused at his discomfort, and then added, “Don’t worry. I think that I am the only one that has. Your secret’s safe with me.”

\--

John groaned as Dr. Keller helped him onto the medical exam table, holding his hand to his side, trying to staunch the bleeding. She glared at him as she forcibly pushed him down on his back and proceeded to cut open his favorite shirt with scissors and said, “Here’s an idea, how about trying to _not_ get shot when you go on missions?”

He let out a pained laugh and replied, “Oh, you know me. I just live for getting sliced open…”

She gave him a pointed look as she shot a local numbing agent into his side. Without even hesitating, she slid the tweezers into the wound and pulled out the bullet just as Rodney walked in.

“Sheppard…”

Jennifer gave the scientist a look and accused, “And _you_ didn’t make it to your fitting for the second time, Rodney.”

He avoided her look and addressed John with, “What are you, a bullet magnet or something? I swear, you get injured every other week, like clockwork! Does the universe have it in for you?” He absently dropped his hand onto John’s leg, and added, “I mean, it’s not like I _blame_ them for shooting at you. You’re certainly _annoying_ enough…”

“Excuse me, _me?_ _I’m_ the one who’s annoying? This coming from the man who—” John winced as Keller started to stitch him up, the numbing wearing off. “—who can ramble on for over twenty minutes on the virtue of Batman over Aquaman…”

Rodney rolled his eyes and absently squeezed his thigh, neither of them noticing Jennifer’s eyes flicking down to where Rodney’s fingers lingered just above the soldier’s knee.

“Oh, c’mon, you can’t actually tell me that Aquaman is a decent superhero…”

“Decent? _Decent_? He controls the oceans, Rodney! The oceans! That’s roughly, oh, say just over seventy-two percent of the world? Yeah, I’d put him at the top of the list.”

Just as they started to build their argument, smirks and eye rolls aplenty, Dr. Keller cut them off with, “As _fascinating_ as this conversation is, Rodney needs to go and get his fitting done, and _you_ , Colonel, need to lay back,” she pushed him back down with a hand, “and recover. No gate travel for a week.”

At that, he glared and then whined.

“A week? Really?”

She glared right back at him, undeterred.

“One week. Seven days. I’m sure you can handle that.”

Rodney snorted, shoved his hands into his pockets and muttered, “Obviously you don’t know him all that well,” and then he motioned for John to follow him, which he moved to do, but then was shoved back down by a firm hand on his shoulder for a second time.

“You wait here.” There was no arguing with _that_ tone. She then walked over to Rodney and whispered something in his ear that had him looking irritated, but then he nodded and then left the room, as if resigned to whatever she had asked him to do, and then she came back to John’s side and said, “Now that _that’s_ settled, I have a favor to ask you, Colonel.”

John sat up slightly and gave her a curious look and carefully asked, “What _kind_ of favor?”

Jennifer bit her lip in an uncharacteristic manner, and then said, “Rodney and I are about to get married, and I need your help to convince him that Atlantis is no place to raise a family.” John was glad that he was lying down because he was fairly certain that he would have fallen over if he’d been standing. “Also,” she gently pressed, “I know you’re his best man, so I thought that you might go easy on the bachelor party? Whatever you do, don’t let Ronon take over, and if other military members are involved, then _please_ keep it to a minimum. I don’t need a hungover groom.”

Wait, what? Not only was she trying to use John to do her dirty work, she was asking him to keep Rodney from drinking too much on his last night as a bachelor? Also, where did she get off assuming? Rodney had never actually _asked_ John to be his best man. He hadn’t asked anyone. Apparently, Jennifer was unaware of that.

Being circumspect in his answer, not in the _least_ bit comfortable with her request, John replied, “Yeah, sure. Just…can I go now?”

Reluctantly, she let him loose from the infirmary, telling him to take it easy, but he took it with a grain of salt, used to having bullet wounds, unfortunately. John made his way down to the lab, certain that was where he’d find Rodney, but was confused when he walked in and saw only Zelenka, along with several other scientists, including Miko and the new girl, Liz Winchester.

“Radek?” He looked up from his tablet. “Where’s McKay?”

The Czech scientist looked amused at his question and answered as he continued with whatever work he was doing, “Oh, he came in here a minute ago and then left in a mood, muttering under his breath about tuxedo fittings, a few not so nice words towards his fiancé, and something about Batman beating Aquaman to death with his own trident...”

John chuckled, and then left and went back down the hall. He was off gate travel, so he could risk being miserable _with_ Rodney at a tuxedo fitting.

He headed towards Dr. Biro’s quarters, who was the one fitting the tuxedos. She apparently was quite adept at sewing and had been asked by Jennifer, who was close friends with the bio scientist, to help them with the wedding preparations, and she had gladly said yes and volunteered her free time to help. Probably why Dr. Keller was so put out, mused John as he approached the room and heard Rodney complaining through the open doorway.

“How many more measurements do you have to take?” he groused just as John walked into the room.

Rodney stood on a small stool while Dr. Elise Biro knelt on one knee on the floor; a pen was tucked behind her ear, there were pins between her lips, a small notepad between two of her fingers, and the measuring tape, in her other hand, was wrapped around the upper part of the scientist’s thigh.

“As many as it takes, Dr. McKay. Now, stay--,” she tugged on his leg for emphasis, “Still!”

She tugged again.

“And be quiet,” she said around the pins in her mouth all too easily, as if she’d done it a hundred times. “I wouldn’t want to accidentally put a pin in your leg, now, would I?”

Rodney rolled his eyes and John snorted in amusement, causing Rodney to turn his head and glare at him. He simply shrugged and crossed his arms in front of his chest while the scientist fumed, but remained silent, obviously not inclined to break the silence at the threat of being pricked in an uncomfortable spot.

As she pulled two pieces of the fabric towards each other and put in a bright red pin, she looked up and smiled when she saw John.

“Good, you’re here! I can get you done, too, in just a moment. Let me finish up with Rodney’s leg measurements, and then I’m gonna put _you_ up on this stool,” Elise said, gesturing absently in John’s direction, and he saw Rodney grin at seeing his friend in the same frustrating position that he was in. “Over there,” she pointed at the chair next to her desk before he could protest, trying to tell her that he would be wearing his Air Force blues. “Just sit and wait a couple minutes, then it’s your turn.”

He could tell from her tone, the same one that she’d used with Rodney, that there was no use arguing with her. She reminded him of one of his old drill instructors.

She knelt down and ran a hand up Rodney’s inner thigh, smirking when he jumped, and then commented, entirely serious, “You hide a lot of muscle in those oversized clothes, Dr. McKay. It’s a privilege to be the one doing your fitting,” and Rodney rolled his eyes, obviously not believing a single word of it, even though her face showed no sign of being anything less than honest.

John watched, entertained and amused, knowing just how accurate her assessment was of Rodney. Despite the way the man complained, he had a solid form under all of his ill-fitted clothes.

As he watched, however, he dreaded his turn.

He then finally asked, “So…are these things _fitted_ -fitted, or will there be room enough for, you know…dancing?”

Dr. Biro’s eyebrows shot up and she paused in her hemming and made a soft sound of surprise.

“Well, that’s a fair point, colonel. Huh. I will need to do a _slightly_ different hem and fit for movement for dancing. Ballroom, especially.” She tucked herself against Rodney’s leg, ignoring his grimace of discomfort as she plucked at a pin on the inner thigh and hummed again. “The thigh will need a _bit_ less room...” She got back up to her feet and walked around him, playing with the back of his tuxedo jacket. “…and the jacket will need to be taken in slightly, in order to properly frame the vest underneath.”

Elise tapped the tape measure against her lips and then said, “But that shouldn’t be too hard. Would you like me to do the same for you?” she asked, turning to look at John.

Oh. So, he had to decide _now._

“Uh, yeah. Sure. It’s a wedding, and I’ll be, you know…dancing.”

She smiled.

“I am familiar with the concept, colonel. Perhaps you can each save a dance for me?” she asked, and both of them looked surprised at her request. John floundered trying to think of something to say, but wasn’t quick enough, as she then said, “Jennifer asked me to be her maid of honor, of course, and I would be delighted to dance with the groom and best man.”

Finally, John got out, “I’m not the best man,” and Rodney looked at him like he’d grown a second head. Which, considering where they were, wouldn’t be entirely out of the question.

“What do you mean, you’re not the best man?” Rodney shot at him, looking utterly confused. “Of course, you’re the best man!”

John glared and snapped at him, “You never asked me to be, McKay!”

The scientist scoffed.

“Yeah, right. Like I’m gonna believe that,” he snapped back in his usual caustic tone, the one he normally reserved for Zelenka. “C’mon, I asked you, like, _weeks_ ago, so don’t you sit there looking at me like I’m the crazy one! Why else would you be here? Besides,” he quickly added, defending his delusion before John could get a word in edgewise, “Dr. Biro knew about it, so obviously I must have asked you!”

John glared at him and then stood up from the bed and growled out, “You never _asked_ , McKay! You think I would just make something like this up? Why would I do that?”

Before either of them could say another word, Dr. Biro spoke up.

“I only know about it because Jennifer told me that the colonel was the best man. She never said anything else about it, and I never asked. So, it’s fully possible, Dr. McKay, that you never asked,” she softly added, as if unsure about getting involved in their personal squabble.

They both paused.

Then John slowly said, “Well…Jennifer did say that I was best man, even though you never asked me. Doesn’t necessarily mean you told her you did. She might have just assumed…”

Rodney looked at him, a furrow appearing on his forehead, and then he mused out loud, “That was the one thing she and I never talked about, actually. I mean, we talked about the wedding, when and where we wanted it, and who we were inviting…but she never said a word about you to me.”

Dr. Biro was obviously trying not to listen in on their conversation, John noted, as he watched her scrawl several numbers onto the small notepad, purposely averting her eyes. Seeing her there made him realize that their conversation should most likely be behind closed doors, so he quickly changed the subject with an abrupt, “Anyway, that’s not all that important. I mean, of course, I’m your best man,” he drawled, brushing it off as something casual, arching in eyebrow in Rodney’s direction and tilting his head toward the seamstress pointedly.

Blessedly picking up on the hint, the usually socially dense scientist nodded.

“Right. Of course. Unimportant. Well, then, in that case, let us finish getting our funeral clothes fitted.”

At that, Elise sniggered and looked back up at her client and said, “Funeral of what, exactly, Dr. McKay? Your bachelorhood? From what I’ve heard, there’s not much there to wither away and die.”

John laughed.

Rodney glared.

She took one last measurement across his shoulders and then nodded.

“Done.”

She turned to John.

He groaned.

\--

About a week after the fitting, the two of them were at lunch. Well, they called it lunch, but it was really a ten minute break at some time that wasn’t quite dinner, that John had dragged Rodney to after he’d spent the last fifteen hours in the lab, completely forgetting to eat, as was his usual habit when he got focused on a project, or was trying to distract himself from something personal.

John couldn’t help but notice that Rodney was acting odder than usual, and so he asked, “So…what’s bothering you?”

Rodney didn’t say anything, just shoveled some mashed potatoes into his mouth and glared at him. Taking that as a sign that he didn’t want to talk about it, he didn’t ask a second time. Instead, he focused on his own food, silently trying to figure out on his own what just might be bothering him.

Zelenka hadn’t looked upset when he’d gone to collect him from the lab, and neither had any of Rodney’s lab assistants, so they weren’t the problem. That meant that it was most likely either someone else he worked with in one of the other departments, or it was--

“It’s Jennifer,” Rodney suddenly said, interrupting John’s train of thought, his shoulders dropping as if he was a balloon being deflated.

“What about Jennifer?” John carefully prodded, pushing his food around on his plate, and Rodney let out a frustrated sigh and began to do his usual babbling as he tried to explain the situation.

“God, where do I start,” he muttered. “Okay, so, first of all, three days ago, she gets on my case about not going with her to the kitchens to taste test different cakes, which, by the way, is not the _least_ bit important to me, and I told her at least a dozen times that so long as it doesn’t have citrus, I don’t care, but that’s not enough for her, apparently. Oh, and then she tells me that her sisters, of which she has three, by the way, all want to come to the wedding and the reception, so could we please consider having our wedding back on earth? Ha!” Rodney scoffed. “Like _that’s_ gonna happen anytime soon! I mean, I told her at least a hundred times that as much as I love her and want to marry her, that as long as Atlantis exists, I am always going to have a job here and I’m not going to just _leave_ it.”

He paused to take another bite of his food, while John bit the inside of his cheek, remembering what Keller had asked him to do. How the hell was he supposed to do that when he knew that there was no way that Rodney would ever be dissuaded from leaving the Pegasus galaxy?

Rodney kept on rambling.

“And then she saw the fittings on the tuxes, and she had the nerve to tell me that Dr. Biro would have to do them over!” He let out an agitated sigh and took a sip of his coffee and then said, “I love her, but sometimes I think she’s trying to, oh, I don’t know…like, change me? I mean, there’s this thing that she does when we’re around people together, where she’ll give me a look and tug on my sleeve, telling me to adjust my tone and it’s starting to feel…well, kind of like she’s putting me through obedience training. Any day now she’s going to start carrying around a rolled-up newspaper to hit me on the nose with, I swear.”

John looked up from where he’d been aimlessly making circles in his potatoes with his fork and bit his tongue. Yeah, he’d noticed that, too, but he’d never brought it up, certain that the scientist had been aware of it and had encouraged it, why else would he put up with it?

He didn’t say anything for a moment, but then said, “Uh…about Jennifer. She wanted me to talk to you.”

Rodney’s eyebrow shot up.

“She did? About what?”

John bit the inside of his lip. Finally, he got out, “Look, I don’t agree with this, so I need you to understand that this is coming from _her_ , and not me, and just…whatever I say, don’t take it out on me, alright? Can you promise me that much?” Rodney gave him a look but nodded and John took a deep breath and then confessed, “Okay. She wants me to convince you that Atlantis is no place to raise a family.”

At that, Rodney’s eyes widened, and he spluttered out, “She said, she, she, she said _what?_ She _knows_ that I’m not planning on leaving Atlantis, even when we get married! I’ve told her this several times over, that I am not leaving my work! Who would do it? Zelenka? Ha! He’s barely competent, even _with_ my help! I can’t even begin to imagine the chaos that he’d wreak if I were gone!” He shook his head in disbelief and then his eyes went narrow and he hissed out under his breath, “That’s it, I’m having a word with her about her interfering…”

John winced and said, fighting against his own will, “Don’t, McKay. I told her that I wouldn’t mention her when I talked to you, but I couldn’t do that in good conscience, you know? It felt like if I did, I’d be going behind your back in a way.”

Rodney nodded, though looking reluctant, and let out an annoyed sigh.

“Okay, fine. But only for now. Because if she tries to do this again, so help me, I’ll--”

“Rodney.”

He pouted.

“Fine.”

\--

It was a few days later when John found out that Ronon knew about the lessons that he’d been giving Rodney. The two of them were in a middle of a sparring session, and John was proud of himself because he’d just managed to duck under Ronon’s swing and came up with a solid hit, but then Ronon had said, “How long have you been teaching McKay how to dance?” and made John trip over his own feet.

Ronon chuckled and tripped him up a second time and said with a knowing look, “You need to work on your footwork, Sheppard.”

John glared up at him from where he was prone on the floor and slowly got back to his feet, grabbing his banto stick as he did, and quipped, “Well, _maybe_ if someone didn’t keep getting their big feet in the way, I might actually improve.”

Ronon rolled his eyes and swung his stick in his hand with an ease that John was envious of.

“Seriously, Sheppard. How long have you been teaching McKay to dance?”

John didn’t answer for a moment, regaining his footing and circling around him, trying to find a way in to get a decent hit on him and end the sparring session. He was more than a little tired of the burly man that constantly beat him whenever they trained. He wasn’t going to answer unless he absolutely had to. He swung his own banto stick, not quite as smoothly as Ronon, but pretty damn well for someone who had only been learning for the past four and a half years.

Finally, finding an opening, he skipped forward and swung--and landed on his side in a surprise hit from his right side as Ronon suddenly switched the banto to his other hand.

Ronon stood over him, smirking, and commented, “Looks like you’d rather get beat up than talk about it. Okay, then. Have it your way,” and then went for another hit, which John managed to avoid, and rolled back up to his feet and fought him for about a minute, until he was thrown to his back yet _another_ time, and he groaned.

“A little over a month,” he finally answered, while still on the ground. “How’d you know? Did Teyla say something?”

Ronon shook his head and explained, “No. I guessed. In my last sparring lesson with McKay, he was dodging more of my hits. His footwork has gotten a lot better. Kind of annoying, actually,” he admitted, sitting down on the floor next to John. “I enjoy hitting him.”

John snorted and sat up a bit more and said, “Sorry to ruin your fun.”

Ronon shrugged.

“There’s nothing wrong with it. He needs to improve in something,” he remarked, and John nodded, silently agreeing, and then John tentatively asked, “You sure you don’t mind that I’ve been teaching him?” and the burly man shook his head and said, “It’s about time he started getting better.”

They sat there for a few more moments, and then Ronon unexpectedly broke the silence first by asking, “You’ve been teaching him dancing. What for?”

John debated on how to answer, afraid Ronon might make fun of him, for it, but then gave in and said, “For his wedding to Keller. It’s an Earth tradition,” he explained. “When two people get married, they have a party afterwards, and it starts with the new husband and wife dancing for the first dance.”

Ronon grunted and said, “On Sateda, the first thing a wedded couple does after their ceremony is go on a hunt together. It proves their loyalty to each other in battle and how they promise to protect each other in every circumstance. At the end of the hunt, they anoint each other in the blood of their kills.” John gave him a look, but then Ronon commented, “Dancing sounds a bit nicer, to be honest. A lot more relaxing. Less messy,” and John gave him a baffled look. That was _not_ what he’d been expecting Ronon to say.

“Uh…yeah,” he finally got out. “The dancing is nice.”

Ronon then gently shoved him, no real effort behind it, and then said, “Keep teaching him. It’ll help him improve,” and then reached down and helped John back up to his feet. As soon as John was back up on his feet, Ronon gave him a look and then let go and went back to put his banto sticks away, leaving John feeling as if he’d just been given some sort of advice, though he wasn’t sure what it was.

He brushed it off and headed back towards his room, determined to clean himself off, taken off-guard when Woolsey suddenly approached him in the hallway.

“I hear that you’ve been giving Dr. McKay a few lessons,” he said abruptly.

John groaned, and growled out, “Geez, does _every_ one know, now? This is like the worst kept secret on the base,” but the older man quickly shook his head and said, “Oh, no, I only found out because I, well, I pressed Teyla for details as to where you’ve been for the past few weeks. I have tried at certain times to contact you in the evenings and have been met with radio silence. She finally told me the truth, but then swore me to secrecy. I, uh…do have a question for you regarding that, though, Colonel.”

John had a vague feeling that he was about to be reprimanded, so he cautiously said, “Sure. What it is it?”

They stopped walking and then Woolsey asked, “Would you be willing to teach a select few, those of us who are interested, of course, how to dance?” John was about to protest, but then Woolsey explained, “I only ask because we have very few people on base with skills outside the military or sciences, and many of us, including myself, are looking for group activities that will help us…de-stress, as it were. And, from what I hear from Teyla, you are a more than competent teacher.”

John heard what he was asking but was still hesitant to give him an answer. Dancing was an intimate thing, and he would much rather not share it with anyone else. Anyone else besides Rodney, of course.

He bit his lip, but then answered, “Let me think it over, alright?” and that seemed to be enough, because Woolsey nodded and gave him a wide smile and responded, “That is a fair answer, Colonel. Of course, I understand that circumstances right now are quite different, as you are helping out a friend. Teaching a class would be quite different, so…I understand. So…you’ll let me know when you decide? No rush, of course,” he reassured him, and John nodded.

“I’ll let you know.”

That seemed to be enough, because the head of the Atlantis base walked away with a slight bounce to his step, as though just the fact that John was considering it was enough to make him happy. John wanted to be annoyed but couldn’t really argue with Woolsey’s logic: science and the military was pretty much all that anybody knew, besides medicine. And with how they seemed to be defending the galaxy almost every week, on a perfect schedule, he understood the need to have activities where people could relax and have fun.

He finally made it back to his room and slowly pulled off his clothes. Luckily, it was still only just after midday, so he could have a shower and then go and find Rodney and drag him out of the lab for at least an hour, maybe grab a late lunch, he mused to himself as he hopped into the shower.

However, just as he got out of the shower and put his clothes and headset back on, a familiar voice came over the comms.

_“Colonel Sheppard?”_

Keller.

He hesitated, his finger hovering over his ear, not sure if he really wanted to respond…but when she repeated his name a second time, he reluctantly tapped it and replied, “Doctor Keller, Colonel Sheppard, here. How can I help you?”

 _“We’d like your assistance in the infirmary please,”_ she said formally, and then explained, _“It seems that a couple of your recruits decided to take a jumper out without permission and are now sitting in my infirmary with some rather severe lacerations due to the fact that neither of them have decent flight experience and didn’t exactly come in for a graceful landing.”_

John mentally groaned and knew immediately who the two recruits were: Spencer and Burton.

“Be right there, Keller,” he replied, and then as he walked to the infirmary, he schooled his expression into one of severe disappointment, even though he was frankly more amused than anything else. He happened to know for a _fact_ that Spencer was an exceptional pilot…and that he had a _massive_ crush on one of the nurses in the infirmary. Well, there went his afternoon plans.

\--

Over the next few days, John found himself remarkably busy, not having a spare second to see Rodney, let alone spend any time with him.

Sure, it had only been about three days, but it felt like a lot longer considering all of the time that they had been spending together recently. They weren’t even able to get in a dance lesson on their usual night, due to the fact that one of the new lab techs had messed something up so badly, that it had caused Rodney to go into one of his hour long rants while fixing the thing, which, of course, took him most of the night to fix.

John noticed that Rodney hadn’t been around at mealtimes and found himself more than vaguely worried about him. If it had only been one, two, or even three meals, he could have easily brushed it off because that was normal for the scientist, but four, six--eight meals? Something was wrong.

He finally caught a break with a few uninterrupted hours, as he’d finally passed on his duties to Lorne for a little while, and so decided to use them to go down and check on Rodney.

The instant he saw him, he swallowed and felt his stomach plummet.

His clothes were wrinkled, his eyes were bloodshot, his hair was sticking up at odd angles, and it looked like he had barely remembered to eat, a half-eaten power bar still sitting on his desk. His hands were doing the thing where they moved too much, stained with dry erase marker along his palms, and he was snapping at practically everyone in the lab. John watched helplessly as Rodney reached for his coffee, making a face as he took a deep drink from his mug, and then flinched at the volume of his voice when he yelled, “I don’t know how many times I have to say this, but whoever is trying to replace my coffee with decaf is getting a demotion and sent to the Midway Station on toilet duty, am I clear?!”

John just gave him a look, and he was so focused on him, it took him off guard when Zelenka was suddenly at his elbow, his hair askew, glasses barely still hanging onto his face, saying, “Oh, thank god, you’re here. He’s lost it, Colonel. I’ve tried to get him to leave the lab, but he won’t, and he’s already made three doctors cry.”

John bit his lip, not sure if it was sad or amusing. He probably only found it amusing because he wasn’t the subject of Rodney’s ire.

“He won’t eat, he’s gone through all of our coffee, and he’s starting to smell,” Zelenka said. “Get him out of here, I’m begging you. I don’t know what happened, but he snapped just over two days ago. I can’t get him to leave. Please, Colonel…”

He sounded desperate and almost as frazzled as Rodney, so John nodded and stepped further into the lab, assessing the best way to approach him. Rodney was gesticulating wildly as he started to berate yet another scientist, his tone scathing and piercing as he tore the woman down with several sharply barbed insults, and that was when John knew that it was worse than usual. Rodney’s insults usually had a faint hint of sarcasm or some ring of truth to them, but this…this was him just being mean.

John shot a commiserating look at the scientist, who looked on the verge of tears, and then barked out, “Rodney!”

He pivoted on his heel at hearing his first name, and it was almost comical as he nearly fell over and looked back at him with wide eyes and his mouth slightly hanging open, as if he had just been caught doing something that he knew he shouldn’t be doing.

“Sheppard,” he breathed out, but before he could say a word, John cut him off with, “McKay. How about you say you’re sorry before I go ahead and drag your ass out of here?”

“What? Why would I--?” he fumbled out, but John glared at him harder, setting his jaw, and that seemed to be enough, because Rodney looked back at her and said, actually sounding contrite, “Uh, sorry…I guess I took it a little too far. Probably just low blood sugar,” he tried to excuse himself, and John shook his head.

He grabbed his sleeve, doing exactly as he said he would, and dragged Rodney out of the lab, the scientist only putting up negligent force in trying to pull away from him. John could hear a collective sigh of relief behind him as soon as he’d gotten McKay out into the hallway, causing him to realize just how bad it had been. He sniffed. Rodney _was_ starting to smell, but from the way he was nearly swaying on his feet, he needed food, first.

As he half pulled, half shoved him down the hallway towards the mess hall, he said, “Okay, Rodney. What’s with the mad scientist routine?”

“What? Oh, c’mon, I wasn’t being any more brusque with them then I usually am,” he said, stopping in the middle of the hallway, brushing John’s hand off him with a dismissive wave. “I’m just trying to keep them from making a mistake that could seriously risk the security of the power of the base. You should _see_ some of the sloppy calculations that they’re pulling out of their asses,” he said, but before he could say anything more, John cut him off.

“No. You’re not being brusque, you are being _mean,_ ” he snapped at him. “Now. Let me repeat myself: what’s wrong?”

Rodney gave him a look, and John was curious when he saw him bite his lip and then said, in an odd tone that John didn’t recognize, “It’s…Jennifer’s given me an ultimatum, with an addendum attached to it should I say yes.”

John said nothing. He swallowed, licked his lips, and then said, “How about we talk about this in private,” and Rodney nodded, and then John moved him to the closest transporter and put in the code that would take them to Rodney’s room. If he put the scientist into a more comfortable setting, he’d probably be able to talk a bit easier. They made it to the room, and John sat down on the edge of the bed. He waved his hands out in front of him, silently encouraging Rodney to continue.

He swallowed twice, paced for a moment, and then finally turned and faced him and explained what he’d started to say earlier.

“Jennifer has told me in no uncertain terms that if I still want to marry her, then I have to let go of Atlantis.” John tightened his jaw but said nothing. “If I still say yes, then she will allow me to finish the projects I am currently working on, and also the wedding can take place here in Atlantis. I, uh…haven’t answered her, yet.”

Well…shit. John didn’t need to know this.

He used his years of training to keep his expression neutral, and then said safely, “Well, that’s up to you. But I need you to not take it out on the staff.” He stood back up. “Now, you need a shower. Go ahead and get cleaned up, and then I expect to see you down at the mess in twenty minutes. Understood?”

Rodney looked like he was about to object, so John cut him off with a pointed finger.

“Ah. Twenty minutes. If you’re not there, I’ll make you learn line dancing.”

At that threat, Rodney shuddered and conceded by hastily moving towards his bathroom, throwing his jacket in the general direction of his closet as he went. As soon as the door closed behind him, John took a deep breath and slowly let it out. And then left.

\--

“God, I am _starving,_ ” Rodney said as he chewed on a roll. “I haven’t really eaten in a couple of days. The work, you know,” he gesticulated with the roll, “It’s been some dense stuff that we’re digging through. We just found a new lab in one of the water-damaged death-trap sections--”

“Is that what we’re calling them, now?” John interjected, watching in amusement as Rodney dipped his roll into his mashed potatoes and took a bite.

Rodney rolled his eyes, chewed, swallowed, and replied, “Oh, ha ha, you’re a riot. Yes, that’s what we’re calling them. Now, as I was _saying_ before you so rudely interrupted me, we just found a new lab and the sheer amount of data in its databanks has us thinking that it was some sort of lab for DNA sequencing. Why the Ancients were digging into DNA sequencing, I don’t know, but considering what we already know about them and their sordid past of making less-than-moral decisions, I have a feeling that it wasn’t for anything good,” he added, raising an eyebrow.

John nodded back at him, taking a sip of his coffee, watching in amusement as Rodney proceeded to nearly inhale the rest of his food at some sort of speed that John didn’t think was possible.

“God,” Rodney finally said. “I really need to keep someone on call to bring me food when I end up doing those projects.”

John gave him a look and leaned back in his chair and remarked, “I thought that was my job,” and felt a faint warmth in his chest when Rodney looked up from his tray and smiled.

“I could make it official,” Rodney quipped. “Get you a title and a little tray. Maybe some shorts, a hat, and a pair of roller-skates,” he added with a raised eyebrow and John snorted and said, “Okay, this is starting to sound like a fantasy that requires me to have a different set of biological equipment,” and was taken aback when Rodney remarked, “No, not really,” and John tried not to choke on his bite, pretty sure that Rodney wasn’t really aware of what he was saying because of his hunger.

Trying to brush it off, he said, “Well, putting that to the side for the time being, how about you tell me what you want for the next few sessions, of…” He glanced around, making sure no one heard him. “…Dance lessons. Since you have shown a distinct distaste for line dancing, do you have anything else in mind?”

Rodney shrugged, swallowed his bite, and as he stabbed at his carrots he said, “Nothing really. I think I just need to make sure my waltz is cleaned up the most,” and John swallowed at hearing his suggestion.

“Uh, why that one?” he asked, wanting to shoot himself the instant he asked it, and Rodney casually replied, “Well, it’s going to be the first dance, and I don’t want to mess it up. I need to get it drilled into me so that it’s muscle memory. In case you haven’t noticed,” he said, chewing on his carrot and swallowing, “I don’t do well at talking and dancing at the same time,” and John tried to stifle his snort, remembering the last lesson, where Rodney had nearly broken his foot from trying to do two things at once. “I’d like to have it down so I can look more than competent when our first dance comes.”

 _Our_ first dance. The image that popped into John’s head when Rodney said those words wasn’t one that he’d ever share, but he suddenly saw himself and Rodney in matching tuxedos and boutonnieres dancing across a room, Rodney leading, looking up at John with that smug smirk of his as their wedding bands glinted in the light, and the colonel shook his head, wondering where the hell _that_ thought had come from. He was obviously talking about Keller.

John simply nodded and said, “Oh. Okay, then. Uh…do you know which song?”

He nodded.

“Wind Beneath Your Wings,” Rodney said, without a single trace of humor, and John was proud of how he managed to not laugh out loud. Instead, he wiped at his mouth with a napkin, and then replied, “Oh, that’s…that’s nice,” and was taken aback when Rodney nodded.

“Yeah, Jennifer loves it. Says it’s one of the most romantic songs ever written, so I thought why not, you know? The piano version, of course, no words,” he quickly clarified, digging into his potatoes once more, and John nodded a second time.

Romantic. Yeah, sure.

Managing to keep his composure, John asked seriously, “Sheena Easton or Bette Midler? There is a bit of a difference,” and without missing a beat, Rodney answered, “Oh, Sheena Easton, Jennifer was _insistent_ on that point. She actually complained as badly as I do when I asked her about it. Almost made me proud to hear her have such a strong opinion about something.”

There was a small grin on the corner of the scientist’s mouth, and John swallowed down the odd feeling that rose in the back of his throat and simply nodded a third time, and then made a mental note to go ask Dr. Winchester if she had it in her extensive music collection. She was sort of the music dealer for the base, as she had brought her entire collection in digital format along with her, and it had apparently nearly taken up all of her allotted 300 gigabytes of personal information. He hadn’t yet gone to her as he hadn’t had the time. He had been warned that she could talk a person’s ear off for hours, and it was wise to keep your distance unless you knew _exactly_ what you wanted.

He gave him a quick nod, and then John stood up and said that he had somewhere he needed to be, when all he needed to be was very far away from Rodney at that moment. He knew that he didn’t like the feeling that he got whenever he thought of Rodney marrying Keller, but the visual that had popped into his mind had taken him off guard: him and Rodney dancing in matching tuxedos. Wedding bands.

God, what the heck had _that_ been about?

He’d always acknowledged in the back of his mind that there was definitely a sort of physical attraction, his body told him that pretty blatantly any time that he was in close proximity to him for too long, and the dance lessons had been a small microcosm of his own personal hell for the past few weeks.

John took a deep breath and headed for the far pier, the one that had the jumpers that weren’t being used. It was always empty.

He normally wasn’t one for introspection, but he was still a bit rattled at what he’d seen in his head.

He wasn’t entirely sure how long he stood there. It was long enough that he eventually got a message from one of the medical staff over his comm, asking him to come and deal with Spencer, yet _again._ And it seemed that he had managed to get Burton in on it, just as he did with every stunt that he tried to pull. He didn’t know what was wrong with the guy, but he admired his dedication, that was for sure.

The instant John stepped into the infirmary, Spencer looked up at him from where he sat on the bed, a nurse wrapping gauze around his middle, and said, “Oh, Colonel! You didn’t have to come by and see me, but the gesture is sweet. Flowers would have worked just as well,” and John rolled his eyes and glanced over at Burton, who was sitting on the opposite bed, looking thoroughly irritated as a burn on his arm was being attended to.

“What’d you do this time, Spencer?” he asked, not entirely sure if he wanted to know the answer, and the young man answered, “I was proving a point that if you’re directly behind a jumper and standing in just the right spot, that you won’t get completely obliterated…and I was right!”

He threw his hand up in the air, but then Burton from the other bed said, “Oh, is that what you call this?” He waved his bandaged arm. “Being right? Sir,” he said, addressing the colonel, “I would like to request to have a different partner for patrol from now on. Sergeant Spencer and I are not exactly seeing eye to eye anymore on what is considered proper safety protocol,” and John bit his lip to keep himself from pointing out that Burton had obviously agreed to it, since he was just as injured as the sergeant.

Instead, he said, “How about this: you two are on clean up duty for the next three weeks. You make it through that without incident, maybe I’ll put you back on the patrol roster.”

Burton looked upset, but Spencer seemed to practically light up and said, “Ooh, really? Does that mean that we can have the leftovers of what anyone leaves behind in the mess hall?” and John rolled his eyes, torn between wanting to laugh at him and wanting to strangle him. He decided to ignore him, instead.

Just as he turned to leave, Jennifer suddenly appeared in his line of vision.

“Ah, Colonel. Good to see you, here. In fact, since you’re here, can I have a minute with you? Maybe check up on that bullet wound?”

It had been nearly two weeks, but John nodded, and let her lead him back to a sequestered bed in the corner that had its own separate curtain. She pulled the curtain and he removed his shirt, letting her have a closer look at the scar, knowing full well that it was a front and that she was trying to corner him, yet again.

“Looks like that’s healing up nicely,” she said, pressing a finger into his side. “Very nicely.”

She poked and prodded a couple more times, asking him questions that he knew weren’t necessary, but he let her pretend for as long as she needed to, to make herself comfortable.

She then stepped back from him and said, “Colonel…I need your help,” and he immediately cut her off with a glare, using the same technique with her that he’d used with his two sergeants just a minute before, and then he bit out firmly, but as politely as possible, “I will not talk to Rodney for you, Jennifer. The two of you are adults, and your issues with each other are exactly that: _your_ issues. Now, if you don’t mind,” he tugged his shirt back on, buttoning it up quickly, “I have to finish my rounds, as well as Spencer and Burton’s rounds, since theirs were cut off prematurely.”

He slid off the bed as he did up the last button, gave her a curt nod, and then briskly strode out of the infirmary, trying to leave the whole awkward encounter behind him. And as he picked up his pace down the mostly deserted hallway, he tried not to look too closely at the feeling that had settled deep into his gut that he felt was a creature that most likely had green eyes.

Instead, John finished the patrol as quickly as he could and then made his way to their usual room for practice.

Rodney was already there, music on, eyes closed as he waltzed aimlessly around the room, counting under his breath…or was he talking about particle physics? John wasn’t sure which was more disconcerting, so he brushed it to the side and instead focused on staying as quiet as possible.

But then the scientist tripped over his own feet, his eyes bolted open, and he let out a high pitched cry of surprise at seeing John leaning in the doorway, his shoulder pressed into the frame, arms crossed over his chest.

“Doing pretty good, McKay. But you still need to work on your footwork,” he said with a smirk as he walked into the room and made his way over to the stereo, double checking that the cd was still in the pocket of his BDUs. He then slid out the classical disc and popped open the plastic case from his pocket to reveal…ah shit. It was the wrong cd.

“Well, crap,” he muttered under his breath, and apparently Rodney’s keen ears heard him, because he said, “What? What’s wrong?”

John swallowed and then turned to face him, waving the cd in his hand.

“This was supposed to be pop music on piano, at least, that’s what the case says,” he said, irritated. Not that he didn’t like the music, he thought to himself as he looked at the actual cd in his hand. On the contrary, he _loved_ Johnny Cash and was glad that he’d gotten it by mistake and would most certainly be listening to it in his own room, later, before he returned it, but it was useless for what they needed to do for their lesson. “I went to Dr. Winchester and she said it was the right cd, but apparently she’s one of those types that just puts cds back into the nearest empty cd case. Go figure.”

He waved the disc in the air a second time for emphasis, but Rodney seemed undeterred and asked, “Well, what is it? Maybe we can use it instead for the time being. It’s just one lesson, after all.”

“Johnny Cash.”

Rodney just nodded and said, “I’m sure that you know a song on there that will work for our purposes, Sheppard. So, have at it.”

John arched an incredulous eyebrow at him but then nodded back at him and then turned and put the cd into the player, pressing play to hear the first few notes of the first song. Nope, not this one. He skipped to number two. Oh, _definitely_ not that one. He skipped through a few more songs…and then paused on number six.

A simple, solo guitar played out over the room, and then an older, raspier Johnny Cash played from the speakers. He put it on repeat.

John swallowed and then turned and faced Rodney, who was standing there with his hands behind his back, his head tilted as he listened to the song. John approached him, and then was confused when Rodney said, “Why do I know this song? It seems…familiar…”

John grabbed Rodney’s hands and put them where they needed to go and then, after Rodney had finally started leading, he said, “It was originally done by the Beatles.”

Rodney’s eyes lit up.

“Oh, this is ‘In My Life’, isn’t it? Wasn’t it originally an upbeat, pop music number?” he asked, and John replied, “Yeah, but you know what they say about Johnny Cash, don’t you?” Rodney shook his head, so he told him, “Once Johnny Cash covers your song, it’s no longer your song,” and Rodney snickered, but his eyes were bright with humor.

Rodney started leading him across the floor and then said as the song wound down, before it went to its first repeat, “Long live the man in black, hmm?” and John nodded, unsure of what to say, suddenly incredibly aware of just how close Rodney was standing next to him, how he seemed to be unconsciously tugging John closer to him, his hand warm on John’s waist, his fingers soft and warm in his right hand, slowly but surely steering him around the room, much slower than he was used to doing with his usual waltz, John knew…but he was doing it perfectly.

John was pretty certain that Rodney wasn’t even aware he was doing it, because if he were, he would have started tripping over both of their feet at that point.

Instead, he said nothing. He kind of lost count of how many times they danced through the song, but it must have been quite a few times, because Rodney steadily drew him closer with each song, until there was no space between them, thighs brushing with every step, chests touching, and hips doing things that John knew that if he thought on it for too long would make him react in ways he shouldn’t.

He was just grateful that he hadn’t reacted so far. Rodney seemed blissfully ignorant of what he was doing, his hand having slipped from John’s waist down to his hip, his thumb absently stroking across his hip bone.

John swallowed. Oh, he was so screwed.

And then Rodney said, his breath brushing across John’s neck, “Thank you for this, John. This is a huge help. You have no idea how much this has helped me,” and John briefly closed his eyes, squeezed them tightly, feeling something trying to rise behind them, and then replied just as quietly, “You’re welcome, Rodney.”

He couldn’t, in good conscience, say the perfunctory response of “no problem” because it would have been a lie.

Doing this, helping McKay learn how to dance for his wedding to the woman he loved…it had been the worst torture that John had ever experienced. Hell, he would have rather gone through the Wraith sucking his life out of his chest a second or third time. That was nothing compared to _this._

Rodney’s breath brushed over his neck, and John tried to count his own breaths to distract himself from the warmth of the scientist’s body and the way that he held him. He followed the way Rodney led him, and mentally complimented him on his footwork, which had actually improved immensely since their first session. Rodney’s grip tightened and he pulled John even closer than before…or maybe he had just imagined that part. Of the two options, the second was most likely.

John inhaled sharply when he felt Rodney’s fingers move from his hip to his lower back. Okay, so he _definitely_ wasn’t imagining that.

He felt his face flush, his heartrate going from sedate to panicked-as-a-jackrabbit in mere seconds. There was no way that Rodney wasn’t aware of it, of that much he was certain, but he said nothing and continued to try to pretend like his heart wasn’t trying to jump out of his chest. His mouth suddenly felt dry. He licked his lips. He heard Rodney let out a sigh. Unable to help himself, John pressed into the gentle pressure of Rodney’s hand on his back.

And he could have sworn he heard the scientist’s breath hitch in his throat.

They slowly came to a stop and John was the first to pull away, hating himself as he did it, and he could have sworn that he felt Rodney try to hold onto his hand, but he brushed it off as his over-active imagination. As soon as he turned off the music, he felt himself become more clear-headed, and he took a deep breath and turned back to his friend…and was taken aback by what he saw.

Rodney stood there in the middle of the empty room, hands at his sides, and the expression on his face…John didn’t think that he’d ever seen it before. He looked open, exposed, as if someone had just dragged him up before a judge and he was about to confess his crimes. His eyes were wide, his mouth was open, and then he bit at his lip as if he was trying to figure out what to say. John felt an odd tension in his gut as Rodney then squeezed his hands into fists and then relaxed them, wondering what was about to happen.

He mentally prepared himself for the worst. He knew he had given too much away.

And then Rodney said, “You’ll still be my best man, right?”

Those were exactly _not_ the words that he had been expecting. Unsure of what else to say besides yes, John nodded and said, “Of course, McKay,” and then before either of them could say anything else, Rodney left the room, and John stood there feeling completely off balance, like the entire world had shifted just exactly one centimeter to the left and he was the only one who knew about it.

What the hell had just happened?

\--

It was only a couple of days later that Rodney casually mentioned to him over lunch, “Oh, by the way, I won’t be needing anymore lessons after tonight.”

John stopped mid-chew, but tried to keep his outward composure, hiding the sheer panic that had just risen in the back of his throat at being told that Rodney didn’t want lessons anymore. It was all because of that stupid dance, he thought to himself, but then inwardly scolded, _Stop jumping to conclusions, Sheppard._

He swallowed his bite and carefully asked, “Uh, why’s that?”

“Jennifer’s bumped up the ceremony. Instead of having to wait another three months, it’s going to be in two weeks,” he practically shouted, sounding excited, and John wanted to throw up. He didn’t. “At first, I was confused when she told me about it, but then she explained how she just couldn’t wait any longer, and I realized that neither do I. For the first time in my life I am jumping into something with both feet and it’s exhilarating!” he added, waving a roll in John’s face and then taking a huge bite out of it.

He took another bite of his food, using the moment to gather his thoughts, and then swallowed and said, “So, then tonight being our last lesson…I’m guessing you want to practice the dance with the right song, right?”

Rodney nodded, swallowed his own bite, and then said, “Actually, yeah, that’d be great. You get the right cd from Liz?”

John raised his eyebrow at that and commented, “Liz? You call Dr. Winchester by her first name, now? Gee, going soft, McKay?” but Rodney just shook his head and explained, “You remember that woman who I yelled at when you came and got me after that one time? When I had been awake for three days straight?” John nodded. “Yeah, well, that’s Dr. Winchester. Liz. I went back and apologized to her and then we got to talking and it turns out that she has flawless taste in music, and her girlfriend is the provisions officer on the Daedalus. I decided to get on good terms with her and it has paid off, boy let me tell you.”

John smirked and said, “Lemme guess: easy access to chocolate?” and Rodney nodded as he chewed on his next bite.

“Yes, and not just the cheap stuff, but the _good_ stuff. The imported Swiss chocolate and some amazing German-Belgian truffles,” he said with his mouth half-full. “I guess it’s not that big of a deal anymore, since I’m going to be going back to earth, but you know, for the time being it doesn’t hurt.”

The sheer casual way Rodney said that he was going back to earth cut straight through him, and John felt like someone had just gutted him open…but, as per usual, he said nothing.

Instead, he smiled and nodded and went back to his lunch.

Just as he was finishing up, Woolsey approached their table, looking slightly nervous, gripping a clipboard tightly between his fingers, and the colonel had a sneaking suspicion as to why he was there. It was quickly confirmed when the man said, “Dr. McKay, Colonel. Uh, colonel…I was wondering if I might receive an answer about my question from…before?”

John swallowed his bite, knowing exactly what he was talking about, but before he could say anything, Rodney looked up and said, “Oh, is this about you asking him to teach a dancing class? I swear, our lessons are one of the worst kept secrets on the base,” and John was wondering how the _hell_ he knew that, and then it was explained when Rodney added, “Listen, Teyla mentioned that you’d asked her about the lessons Sheppard’s been giving me, and I had a hunch that you were going to bug him about it. You remind me of Donny Markle in my senior year of high school, president of the senior class and determined to get everyone to into every single club, including me, despite the fact that I was twelve.” He pointed at the clipboard. “It’s a list of everyone who wants to be in his class, isn’t it?” Again, not waiting for an answer, Rodney plowed on and remarked, “Why am I not surprised. Typical Kirk move.”

John was floundering, completely taken aback, and then managed to answer Woolsey’s original question, “I’ve given it some thought, sir, but I think I’ll have to politely decline.”

He was then baffled when Rodney snorted, rolled his eyes, and said, “Oh, please. Richard, don’t be fooled. He’s an excellent teacher and he’s going to need someone to annoy when I’m gone, go ahead and put him down as a yes,” and John breathed heavily out of his nose and then glared at him.

Woolsey looked between the two of them, as if not sure which one of them to listen to.

John let out a frustrated sigh and corrected him, “For now, let’s just say that I’ll think about it some more. Alright?”

Their leader nodded and walked away, casting another glance back at him, and John glared at Rodney yet again, irritated that he’d just volunteered him for something that he wasn’t entirely sure that wanted to do. Correction: something that he _knew_ he didn’t want to do.

“What was that?” he bit out, not bothering to hide his irritation with him, and Rodney waved a hand at him, as if brushing him off, and answered, “Oh, you know that once I go, you’re going to go out of your mind unless you have some people to boss around and bicker with. You need to have something to do, and this is the perfect solution. I don’t know why you’re so against it.”

John snapped back at him, “I’m not a teacher, McKay! I don’t have the temperament for it, never have,” he added, glancing off in the direction that Woolsey had come from. “I was constantly at odds with my commanding officers, and when I got demoted they could have put me in charge of the new recruits, but they knew better than to do that, and had me running flights to Antarctica, instead. I didn’t teach you by choice, I only taught you because you wore me down into submission!”

Rodney looked up at him, his eyes wide, his fork stopped midway between the tray and his mouth.

“What? Are you…are you serious?”

God, he hadn’t meant to say it like that.

He quickly tried to backpedal, saying, “Wait, no, I didn’t mean--I didn’t mean it like that, McKay. I mean…Look,” he tried a different tactic, “Of course I would teach you, help you out, I mean--you’re my best friend, Rodney. I’d have said yes, eventually, you know that; I just…you know. I’m not so good with the words.”

Rodney snorted, put his fork down, and nodded and said, “You certainly have that part right.”

John felt suddenly insecure, despite the fact that Rodney was trying to brush it all off as something inconsequential. Maybe it _was_ inconsequential. Feeling confused, and more than a little bit rattled, he bit his lip and then got out, “You know that I’m not good with words and now you know that I’m not usually good at teaching, either. Just…I promise you that I’ll think about it, okay?” Rodney gave him a skeptical look and John pushed, “I’m _serious_ , Rodney. I’ll give it some serious thought. Besides,” he quickly added, stabbing at a carrot on his tray, “You’re right about one thing: I’m going to be bored as hell once you go. Who am I going to boss around?”

He arched an eyebrow at him, and Rodney chuckled and went back to his food, and soon the awkwardness between the two of them was gone. Thank god.

\--

“You’ve got the music?” he asked, and John rolled his eyes and waved the cd case at him as he walked over and popped it into the player.

“Yes, I’ve got the music, McKay,” he drawled. “I made sure it was the right cd before I left. By the way, you were right about Dr. Winchester: she has _excellent_ taste in music,” and Rodney rolled his eyes right back at him and said, “She let you keep the Johnny Cash cd, didn’t she?” and he nodded.

“Yep. Said she had two copies of it and was more than happy to help me out,” he said with a grin, and Rodney rolled his eyes a second time.

He then said, “See? Classic Kirk, what did I tell you?”

John ignored him and put the music on the right track and then walked back over to Rodney, keeping the music on pause for the time being. He got himself into position, Rodney’s hand on his waist, his own hand on his shoulder, and then put their hands together off to the side and said, “Okay, let’s remember the basics before we start back up.” Rodney looked irritated, so John cut him off before he could complain, saying, “You know the secret to dancing right, McKay? You gotta know the steps before you add the music.”

He rolled his eyes and muttered, “Yeah, yeah, whatever, let’s just get this over with,” and John tried not to take his tone personally, even though it sounded like Rodney wanted to be anywhere than right there at that particular moment.

John swallowed and adjusted his grip and then made sure Rodney was leading correctly, taking him through the steps as clinically as possible, gently correcting the scientist when he got too sloppy, rushed, or too complacent. Rodney didn’t snap at him once, and that had John worried the most.

After running though it a few times, John pulled away and went back to the cd player and pressed play and made sure that it was on repeat.

When he walked back, the piano music tinkling from its speakers, Rodney said as John put him into position once more, “Let’s just get through this as quickly as possible, alright?” and John could feel the tension in his friend’s body as he lead him around the dance floor, almost forcefully, completely at odds with the light music.

He didn’t say anything about it, just let Rodney push him around until he started to unclench.

As they danced, Rodney slowly became looser, more comfortable, and the distance that John had been keeping between the two of them slowly shrunk. He didn’t know if Rodney was doing on purpose or not, but the solid eight inches that had been between them was now only two, and he was unsure of whether or not he should pull away. If he pulled away, would it only draw more attention to what Rodney was doing? But if he _didn’t_ pull away, would Rodney notice and wonder why?

Torn between the two, he decided not to do anything, and then was taken aback when Rodney suddenly stopped.

No warning of any kind. He simply stopped in the middle of the room, and John felt a surge of some odd emotion in the back of his throat. He swallowed it down and waited for Rodney to either say or do something to explain himself.

And then Rodney asked, “Do you have the other cd on you?”

John nodded, and knew what the scientist was asking him, so he went back over to the cd player, removed the cd and pulled out the Johnny Cash cd from the pocket of his BDUs and popped it in, putting it to the same song that had played before, and then hesitated before walking back over to Rodney.

With only faint hesitation, he took John’s hand in his and put his other hand back on his waist and started to lead him back around the room. They started off a respectable distance apart, and then, just as before, they inched closer together as they danced, but this time it seemed on purpose: Rodney obviously tugged him closer with the hand on John’s waist every lap around the room, and the colonel swallowed, trying to keep his body under control, his head swimming as he breathed in Rodney’s scent. Like ocean air and coffee. Salty and sweet.

John mentally snorted at how appropriate it was for him, but then lost his train of thought when he felt Rodney’s breath across his neck and cheek.

And then in a voice barely above a whisper, John could have sworn that he heard Rodney say, “Give me a reason, John.”

He didn’t know what it meant, so he said nothing, and he wasn’t entirely sure that he _had_ heard it, as there was a distinct possibility that he was hallucinating because of his proximity to the man. He licked his lips. The silence stretched out between them, and he swallowed, trying to shove down his body’s natural reaction to the younger scientist.

But then Rodney slowly came to a stop, and said, “I’m no good at this, Sheppard. So…thank you,” and then he was gone…

…and John stood in the middle of the room, his body slowly going cold at the abrupt absence of Rodney’s body against his.

Okay, so what the _hell_ had just happened?

\--

Over the next few days, John saw very little of the scientist, who seemed to be not _avoiding_ him, exactly, but he wasn’t seeking him out the way that he normally did, and John took notice of it. And apparently, so did Teyla.

She sat down next to him as he sat down with his dinner tray in the mess hall, and said in that soft, concerning way of hers, “I have not seen Rodney lately. Is everything alright between the two of you?”, and John nodded as he took a bite of his roll, and then tried to brush it off as inconsequential by saying, “He’s probably just busy with the wedding planning with Keller,” but Teyla arched a perfectly shaped eyebrow at him, and he had the feeling that she didn’t quite believe him.

“Yes, the wedding,” she said lightly, cutting up her own food on her plate, nice and neatly. “I hear it’s happening much sooner. Are you excited for Rodney?”

He stopped chewing, swallowed, and then gave her a sideways glance, feeling that she was asking him something else entirely. He wasn’t entirely sure how to answer, because he had the feeling that however he answered, she would hear the lie in his voice, so instead he simply nodded, and took another bite.

Even though she didn’t say anything, he felt that her silence was somehow even more judgmental.

The silence stretched for a few moments, and then Ronon sat down across from them, breaking the silence with his usual loud abruptness, saying, “Stop assigning those two idiots near my rooms, and tell them the next time one of them tries to ask me to spar with them, I’m gonna break their arms. Both of them.”

John rolled his eyes, though he was silently grateful for the change of subject, wanting to talk about _any_ thing besides the wedding, for the love of god, and said in return, “Don’t tell me. Spencer and Burton?” Ronon nodded. “Okay, I’ll see what I can do. Those two, I swear,” he muttered, stabbing at his food, “If they do anything more, I’m gonna have to demote both of those idiots. I honestly don’t know how they made it into the air force,” he added with an exaggerated eye roll.

Ronon shrugged, and then, just as he took a mouthful of potato, he said, “So, McKay’s getting married in a week. Gone soon after. How you dealin’?”

John grit his teeth and tried not to snap at him. Instead, he took a sip of his drink, and answered as evenly as he could, “Just fine, if you must know. Now, can we _not_ talk about it?” and he stabbed at his food, probably a bit too harshly, because both of them gave him a look.

“You gotta find someone to replace McKay,” Ronon said in that straightforward way of his as he popped a grape into his mouth, and John nearly choked on his water. “Have any choices, yet?”

John gasped for a moment, getting his breath back, and then glanced over at Teyla, who also seemed interested in his answer, and then finally got out, “No, not yet. Though Radek, of course, is at the top of it. He’s done some work with us in the past. He’d be a good fit. Besides,” he quickly added, “He can actually handle a gun.”

Ronon nodded back at John, silently agreeing with him as he dug into his meal in his typical enthusiastic manner.

Teyla seemed upset by the conversation, so John changed the subject, yet again.

“So, uh…Woolsey has asked me if I could teach a dance class for fun,” he mentioned, and wondered why the _hell_ he thought that would be a better topic of conversation, but it seemed to work, because Ronon snorted and Teyla smiled and said, “That sounds wonderful, John. You would be an excellent teacher,” and Ronon snorted and muttered, “You’ve obviously never seen him teach a class to his men,” and then John heard him grunt as Teyla lightly kicked him under the table.

She then asked, “Are you going to say yes?” and he shrugged and answered, “Still not sure about it, but it might be a good idea to…you know…occupy my time.”

He knew what he wasn’t saying, and apparently so did the both of them, as he saw the two of them share a look with each other out of the corner of his eye as he bent his head back over his tray, focusing far too intently on his potatoes. Why was it always potatoes?

Within a few moments, however, Ronon said something about his training of some of the soldiers, and soon the three of them were in a conversation about how they needed to change the training, and how Teyla was going to start taking a more active part in it. John was looking forward to that, to be honest. He couldn’t wait to see his men being taken down by her in the combat ring. As far as he was concerned, they all needed to be knocked down a peg or two.

Teyla was the first of them to finish, and as she stood up, she said, “I am going to find Rodney and see what I can do to help with wedding preparations.”

John gave her a look and was confused when she gave him a rather hard look back at him right before she turned and walked away. Ronon grunted at him again, and then reached across the table and stole the apple off of John’s tray, saying, “You gonna eat that?” and then took a large bite out of it.

He wanted to be upset, but he found that he barely even cared, his appetite suddenly gone, and he wasn’t even sure why.

He pushed his tray away and stared aimlessly, wondering why Teyla was acting so odd around him. Even Ronon seemed to be acting different, and it bothered him that he didn’t know what it was, though he had the faint inkling that it had something to do with Rodney from the way they’d talked about him.

Feeling frustrated, John stood up and left.

He didn’t head back to his quarters.

Instead, he stalked down the corridors of the city, nodding politely to some of the men that were on patrol, aimlessly wandering, trying to quiet down his thoughts and sort them out, but they seemed to ignore his every effort, and soon it was just a white noise of confusion that was becoming an irritation. He wanted to figure it out, but he had the feeling that it was all in vain. He knew exactly what he felt for Rodney…and he knew it wasn’t going away. It would never go away.

He turned around and headed back for the mess hall after about two hours of wandering and was taken off guard when he heard Rodney and Teyla’s voice coming out of the area where they prepared the food for the meals, the kitchen area, more or less.

“Rodney,” he heard Teyla’s soft voice say in a slightly aggrieved tone, “You have to pick one. Not four or five flavors, but _one_. Jennifer has already told you that she isn’t picky, and so she is showing you the consideration of letting you pick the cake, so could you please narrow it down?”

John snorted to himself when he heard the scientist reply, “You think this is _easy_ for me? Besides the fact that I can’t have citrus, I don’t know which one of these will make everyone _else_ happy. In case you haven’t noticed, I tend to make decisions that don’t really agree with the people around me. So, pardon me if I’m being careful about what cake to serve at my wedding.” John could hear his sigh from where he stood listening in on them in the hall. Which he shouldn’t be doing. At all. But then Rodney said, “It’s just…I kinda thought she would be here to do this _with_ me, you know? I mean, I know this isn’t a big thing for you, Teyla, and that it’s just a silly earth custom, but…usually the couple does this sort of thing _together._ And she’s not here, so it feels…”

There was a long pause, and then Teyla finished for him, “Not as meaningful?”

God, she was good with getting to the heart of things.

John moved slightly closer and caught a glimpse of the two of them standing in the room and saw Rodney nod as he said, “Yeah, pretty much. I just…I don’t have a lot of time left here, and I wanted to make a few memories of the two of us _here_ , you know?” He let another sigh. “I should at least pick out something that Sheppard would like,” he suddenly said, “Because I know he’ll complain the entire time if he doesn’t like the cake.”

Wait…what? Rodney cared about the cake because of him?

John then saw Teyla smile at the scientist and she said, “That is very thoughtful of you, Rodney. Do you happen to know which flavors John prefers?” she gently inquired, and the colonel swore that she somehow knew that he was listening in on their conversation, especially when she added, “I am sure that he will appreciate it.”

He heard Rodney make a noise in the back of his throat, as if unsure, and then he said, “Okay. Well…vanilla is out. He doesn’t really care for that,” and John smiled, remembering the conversation they’d had a couple years back. He’d complained for about an hour on the merits of chocolate over vanilla. “He likes chocolate, but he also really likes the other flavors, though he’d never admit it out loud. I’ve seen him take a slice of the carrot cake whenever they put it out.”

John was startled. Rodney noticed that?

He heard him hem and haw over his choices, and then heard him say, “I’m thinking it’ll either be the carrot cake, the cinnamon cake, or the chocolate.”

“If you would care for a word of advice,” John heard Teyla say, “I am certain that the cinnamon would be very popular among your guests at the ceremony. If I seem to recall correctly,” she mused out loud, “Whenever there have been those…cinnamon rolls, I believe you call them, they have always been eaten quite quickly.”

He heard Rodney make a sound of agreement, and then the scientist said, “Good call. Actually, that makes it nice and easy. Cinnamon it is.”

John raised and eyebrow and mentally snorted. That was the fastest he’d ever heard the man come to a decision regarding food.

It seemed that Teyla was just as surprised, because she said in that tactful way of hers, “That was a very…concise decision, Rodney. Would you like me to tell Jennifer, or would you prefer to tell her yourself?” she asked, and from where John stood, he could see the tension in Rodney’s shoulders.

“Uh, I guess _I_ should be the one to tell her, but I do have work to get to…” John could hear the excuse was flimsy, even from the corridor. “…So, if you could, I mean, if it’s not too much trouble--”

Teyla put him out of his misery with a gentle hand on his wrist as she deftly interrupted his babbling and said, “I will gladly tell her, Rodney. You are busy, after all.”

At that point, John realized that he shouldn’t be standing there, and so moved down the hallway as quietly as he could, but also as quickly as he could, feeling a faint twinge of guilt for listening in. Sure, it had been an innocent conversation, but it still didn’t feel right. He knew he shouldn’t have done that.

As he went through the rest of his patrol, he found himself missing his usual evening routine. Usually, by this point, he and Rodney would have already gone over the steps for a new dance, and Rodney would already be complaining about how long John was taking to get him through the steps, saying he had already mastered it. And then John always proved him wrong. Instead of that, however, he found himself circling back to his room, already debating about turning in early.

He had started giving Lorne more responsibility, and so he didn’t have as much to do any more in terms of paperwork and direct overseeing of the men. He realized he’d been spending all of his extra time with Rodney.

But now he wasn’t, and he now had all of these holes in his day that he could finally see were Rodney-shaped.

He slipped into his room and quickly stripped down and hopped into the shower. As soon as he was done, he threw on his cleanest clothes, his boots, and headed back out. He was too awake to go to bed early, so maybe he’d just wander down to his old favorite spot just outside of the main tower.

It was the place where Rodney liked to whale watch, or whatever it was called, because they weren’t actually whales. John had always liked it because of the stained-glass window behind him and that not a lot of people used it because it was so close to Woolsey’s office. Luckily, John knew that the man had already retired for the evening, leaving him alone out on the terrace-like space and overlooking the water, with the open night sky above him, nearly as bright as day with the sheer expanse of starlight, unfiltered by any pollution.

God. Now _there_ was a view that he’d never get tired of.

It was exactly what he needed to take his mind off of what was going on. But, of course, it wasn’t working. Instead, all he could think of was the wedding and how it was inching even closer with every moment that passed. And that, soon enough, Rodney was going to be back on earth. Gone.

John _still_ couldn’t believe that Rodney had said yes to Jennifer’s demands, and no matter how many times he tried to wrap his head around it, it still lacked an explanation.

He stood there, leaning against the rail, looking out over the water, and then he saw a waterspout and he knew it was Sam.

John knew that he should have been more annoyed when Rodney had named the whale Sam in honor of the woman that he’d been lusting after ever since he’d laid eyes on her, but instead he was amused by it. Honestly, he always knew that Rodney’s feelings for Carter weren’t really real, but a passionate crush that would always remain in the realm of fantasy. But Keller…

God. John hated the way he always felt a twist in his stomach every single time he thought of her. She was a good person and a good doctor, and he _knew_ better than to take it out on her, so he tried not to. But it didn’t always work, and he knew that, and he also knew that it was the worst way that a man in his particular position of command should act. When Carter had been in charge, he’d tried to be nice about it, but he had the feeling that she had known exactly why it was so hard for him to be nice to the doctor.

Unlike Dr. Weir, or Woolsey, John saw Samantha Carter as his equal because of her military background. Which is why her silent disapproval of his actions had been so hard to take.

As he leaned against the railing, he heard the words of the Johnny Cash song running through his head, and he half-smiled to himself and let out a sigh. He never should have played that song, because now he knew that every time he would play it, he’d think of Rodney.

_All these places have their moments, with lovers and friends, I still can recall-- in my life, I’ve loved them all. --but of all these friends and lovers, there is no one compares with you._

He bit his lip. And, unbidden, he felt his eyes stinging sharply, inexplicably, and then he tasted salt on his lips. He absently licked it off, and then brought up the back of his hand and wiped his face.

Time to go to bed.

\--

Several days later, John found himself back in Dr. Biro’s quarters as she made some last-minute adjustments on his tux, even as he insisted that it was fine.

Elise stared up at him, a pin in her mouth and another one in her hand, down near his hip, and she said, exasperated, “Sir, if you stop moving, then I can finish this. Now, please, let me finish.” She tugged on the jacket for emphasis, and then added, sounding annoyed, “I still have to adjust Dr. McKay’s tux one more time, and I don’t want this to take any longer than it has to.”

John stopped moving and then glanced down at the top of her head and carefully inquired, “Why do you have to do his, again? I thought you finished his already.”

“You would think, wouldn’t you?” she remarked, standing back up and adjusting the bright red pin once more before quickly adjusting her hair, which was starting to fall out of its bun. “But Jennifer insists that it still doesn’t fit quite right, so, last minute alterations it is. The rehearsal dinner is tonight, and the wedding is tomorrow, and I still have to make an adjustment on my _own_ dress…she better not have me make adjustments on _her_ dress, or so help me…” She then turned away from him and made a note on a notepad, and John slowly started to move his hand to scratch his nose, but then she said, without even turning around, “Sir, if you move one more time, I will sew you into that tuxedo permanently, and not even Dr. Keller will be able to get you out of it. Understood?”

At the tone in the doctor’s voice, he immediately stopped. It was a wonder that she was a bio-scientist, considering her aptitude for being a drill sergeant, he thought to himself.

Instead, he lightly asked, “Excited to be the maid of honor?” and she let out noncommittal sound and then remarked, “Oh, let’s just say that I _was_. Now…well, can’t say no to her, now can I?”

She sounded distracted, almost like she didn’t mean to say it, and the colonel’s suspicion was confirmed when she suddenly looked up, eyes wide, and quickly said, “Oh, god, I didn’t mean to say that out loud. Sir, I’m so sorry, I’m not disparaging her in _any_ way, I’m just tired and overworked and--”

He cut her off before she could get too worked up and gently said, “It’s okay, Dr. Biro. I believe you. Besides, I, uh…kinda know what you mean.”

She let out a sigh of relief and then bent back down on her knees and said, “Okay, just give me a moment here and I’ll be done.”

As soon as she said that, her door slid open and revealed a disheveled Rodney, who looked as if he was about to say something, but then suddenly balked at seeing John in the middle of the room, standing as stiffly as a mannequin as Dr. Biro sewed a small adjustment on the pant leg.

“Colonel…”

John saw the awkwardness in Rodney’s eyes, so quickly filled the silence with, “McKay, good to see you keeping your appointment. She’ll get to you, soon as she’s done torturing me.”

Rodney nodded, and then slowly walked the rest of the way into her quarters, and then said, “I, uh…I’ve been busy, recently, so I’m sorry that we, uh, haven’t been able to spend our usual time together, so…yeah. Sorry about that,” he finished, licking his lips and glancing to the side, anywhere but looking at John.

The silence stretched, but luckily Dr. Biro filled it up, saying, “Okay, I am just about done with you, colonel, so Dr. McKay, if you could go ahead behind the screen over there,” she gestured to the shoji screen that she had standing in the corner of her room, “And step into your tux, then by the time I’m finished here, I can go ahead and finish up yours. Now, colonel, once I’m done, could you stay until I’m done with Dr. McKay? I need to see the two of you side by side for a moment before I finish.”

John nodded and waited until she said he could move, and then watched as Rodney was dragged to where he’d been and put through the same process that he had. He took a perverse pleasure in seeing him suffer much the same way he had, but then balked when Elise suddenly reached over and grabbed him firmly by his elbow and practically manhandled him to the middle of the room to stand next to Rodney.

“Okay, now let me take a look…”

She stared at the two of them, and John moved to put his hands into his pockets, but she glared at him when he did, so he stopped.

In his peripheral, he saw Rodney seemed to be just as awkward as he was, not knowing where to put his hands, so John turned his attention back to Dr. Biro, where she stood in front of them, tapping a pen against her lips, her eyes scanning them up and down, as if looking for any minute flaws.

Finally, she said, “Perfect! The two of you look matching, the way the groom and the best man should. Go ahead and change back,” she said lightly, and then quickly added, “Oh, and Jennifer wanted me to remind the two of you to head over to the botany labs to pick up your boutonnieres.”

John nodded, and they took turns changing behind the screen, and then found themselves walking together to the labs.

Nothing was said between the two of them and the errand was over and done before John did something stupid, like open his mouth. By the time he was back in his room, he felt like a string on his guitar that had been tuned far too tightly, and that he was liable to snap at any second from any bit of pressure put on him. He knew he had to get ready for the rehearsal dinner and his speech, and so he turned to his closet, even though a part of him wanted to throw a fit like a five-year-old who wasn’t getting his way.

Jennifer had told everyone that the rehearsal dinner would be light fare, but to still dress up as nicely as you could. Formal attire, but not black tie. Reluctantly, John reached for his one suit that hung next to his dress blues. He decided to forego the tie and leave the first couple of buttons on the shirt undone instead.

You could lead a horse to water, but you couldn’t make him wrap the knot around his neck. Or something like that, he mused to himself as he got dressed and then checked his hair in the bathroom mirror.

Okay.

He could do this.

\--

Yeah, so…he couldn’t do this.

John stood awkwardly off to the side as everyone filtered into the mess hall that had been appropriated for the evening, eyeing everybody’s varying attire. When you were sent on a mission to the other side of the galaxy, choices were rather limited. He was surprised to see that Zelenka cleaned up rather well but wasn’t at _all_ surprised at seeing that Woolsey had one of the nicest suits there. Most likely a holdover from his days of being a lawyer, no doubt.

John fiddled with the drink in his hand, wishing it had more alcohol in it, and then glanced over at Ronon, who looked the most uncomfortable out of everyone there. He was wearing the same suit he wore when he went back to earth with John, when his father had passed. Teyla looked lovely in a dark red dress that was most likely a loan from one of the women on base.

Slightly reluctantly, John made his way over to the table where Rodney and Jennifer were sitting, along with Dr. Biro.

He shared a look with her as she adjusted herself in her seat, and then said as he sat down, “Dr. Biro, you look lovely. I like your dress.”

She absently tugged at one of the dark blue straps and replied with a slight roll of her eyes, “Thank you, colonel, though the dress doesn’t agree with me. Didn’t have time to adjust it,” she added with a pointed look, and he stifled a chuckle at knowing what she was referring to.

Rodney finally turned to him after whispering conspiratorially with his fiancé, and said, “Oh, John. So…with regards to the speech. You’re okay that we want to do it at the rehearsal dinner, right? It’s just, the Daedalus’ schedule is tight, so we don’t really have time to do a reception tomorrow evening because of that, and so Jennifer thought--” John saw her poke him in the ribs. “ _We_ thought, you know, that it would be best if we did it tonight.”

John just nodded.

“It’s fine, Rodney,” he said, trying to sound reassuring, but felt less than comfortable as Rodney then stood up and clinked his glass and loudly cleared his throat.

“Uh, hello? Can everyone hear me?” All of the soft conversations that had been going on went silent, and Rodney continued. “We want to thank you for coming out tonight for this dinner. Since we are the ones hosting it, by tradition, we are the ones who should speak, but…uh, due to circumstances being what they are, we have asked the best man and the maid of honor to do the honors tonight.”

He looked down at Jennifer, who gave him a small nod, as if to say that he’d done it right, and then he said, “So, I will turn the time over to Dr. Biro.”

John watched as she blanched, took a long sip of the water in front of her, and then stood up.

She licked her lips and started with, “Hello, everyone. As maid of honor, I am expected to give a speech. I am not very good at speeches, which is why I work in biology,” she quipped and everyone laughed, even Rodney. “However, I am good at friendship. At least, I’d like to think that I am.” She swallowed. “When you work in a place like this, where your life is your work and your work is your life, the people you work with become more than just friends, they become family. And, if you’re as lucky as Jennifer, you find someone who cares about you just as much as they care about their work.”

John felt his chest tighten, and he purposely avoided looking over at Rodney, even though that was the only thing that he wanted to do at that moment. Instead, he listened as she continued her speech, wondering how he was going to measure up to it.

“We are all here because we are passionate about what we do. And, if we’re lucky, we find someone that we’re just as passionate about. Jennifer quickly became my friend, reaching out to me when I needed it the most, when I was feeling homesick and heartbroken over a life of what ifs. What if I had stayed? Would I still be in the sciences? Or would I be married with a kid on the way?” she asked rhetorically. “But Jennifer assuaged those fears and showed me that my life is what I chose it to be. And that I should love my choices.”

She reached down and gently grasped Dr. Keller’s hand and then looked at Rodney.

“Rodney. You are getting a woman who loves her work. You are…” She hesitated and then swallowed. “…You are about to marry someone who can make those dreams of family come true, and someone who can always see the sunshine behind the clouds. She brings light to everyone she meets, and I am certain that she will bring it to you.” She then raised her water glass to the two of them and said softly, but loud enough for everyone to hear, “To Jennifer and Rodney.”

Everyone raised their glasses, and then she sat down, and that was when Rodney gave John a look. Oh, god. It was like a nightmare.

Slowly, he stood up and everyone’s eyes turned to him.

He shoved his hands into his pockets and said, “I’m just gonna get right into it. Let me warn you, I’m not all that great with words,” and a susurrus of laughter swept through the mess hall and a few of his soldiers gave him amused looks. He continued.

“I am not someone who says the word friend lightly. So, when I say that Rodney McKay is my _best_ friend, please understand that I mean that.” Oh, god. No. Keep it together John. “When Rodney told me that he was going to propose to Jennifer, I was…excited for him.” Lies, all lies. “I can’t think of anyone who deserves happiness more than the man sitting right next to me.” True. “Finding love for your work is hard enough but finding love for another person in your life can be even harder. But I’ve never known Rodney McKay to back down from a challenge,” he said, and everyone smiled.

He swallowed, yet again, and then ended it with, “In a place like this, sometimes it’s hard to remember that we’re allowed to have a life outside of work, because everything we do is work. But Rodney…he found a way. And I just want to say to you,” he said, turning his gaze to Keller, “That you are marrying the best man that I have ever come to know. He may seem selfish, but he is one of the most selfless men I’ve ever met. He may act like he’s smarter than everyone around him…because most of the time he is,” he added, and everyone laughed, while Jennifer rolled her eyes and smiled. “In short, you are the luckiest woman in the world to say that you have a man like Rodney by your side.”

It _killed_ him. He raised a glass, biting back the other words from coming out, and saluted them, and then they all ate. Nearly an hour and a half later, Woolsey announced that they would have their first dance, even though they weren’t yet married. Everything was all turned around, all because they were going to be gone tomorrow night.

He watched as they took to the floor, and the instant he saw Rodney’s hand go around Keller’s waist, something inside of him died.

They danced, everyone else got onto the floor, and then John was taken aback when several minutes later Rodney was suddenly right in front of him, hand extended.

John looked up at him from where he was still sitting at the table, confused, and said, “Uh…Rodney? What are you doing?” but the scientist shook his head and muttered, “Look, I already look like an idiot, so you might as well be humiliated along with me.”

Snorting, John let him drag him to the floor, and then was taken aback when he heard Johnny Cash come on. He looked at Rodney, who ducked his eyes and said, “So, I might have requested it.”

They didn’t say anything else, and John let himself be led around the room. He glanced at the other couples and smiled when he saw Ronon dancing with Dr. Biro, while she blushed furiously, and saw Teyla dancing with Woolsey, who was leading her quite well across the floor. He obviously didn’t need any dancing lessons.

John found himself forgetting where he was, leaning into Rodney more than he probably should, savoring it for what he knew was the last time.

As soon as the song was over, however, he slipped out of the mess hall as discreetly as he could, and then wandered down to his usual favorite spot. The sun had long gone down, and John was grateful for it, as it left him alone with the stars and the ocean, just the way that he liked it.

He breathed in the night air.

Rodney was going to be gone tomorrow.

And there was nothing he could do about it.

John was far away enough from the party that he couldn’t hear it, luckily, so the only sounds that he heard were the low hum of the city’s power grid, and the lapping of the waves far beneath him, brushing against the side of the metal and concrete embankment. He loved the sounds of Atlantis at night.

He closed his eyes and enjoyed the silence while he could. But it was suddenly broken by a voice saying, “Knew I’d find you here.”

Rodney.

John turned around, but before he could say anything, Rodney stepped forward and put a hand up and stopped him with, “Look, I don’t know what else to do right now except for this. So…I need you to close your eyes.” John arched an eyebrow at him, but nodded and did as he asked, hearing the scientist mutter under his breath, “Oh, this had better work…”

And then the next thing he knew, he was being kissed.

Keeping his eyes tightly closed, John leaned into it, hating himself but also not denying the fact that he had imagined kissing him for so long that he was not going to back out of it when it was being given to him so freely. He heard Rodney gasp in surprise, and John took advantage of it, sliding his tongue into his mouth and reaching up and wrapping his fingers around the back of the scientist’s neck, holding him so he couldn’t escape, his eyes still shut.

He put as much of himself into the kiss as he could, damning the consequences. If this was all he ever got, then so be it. He was going to be selfish about it.

After what felt like an hour, but was probably only a minute or two, John slowly pulled back and breathed out, with his eyes still closed, resting his forehead to Rodney’s, “You need to go back,” hating himself as he said it, but knowing that it was the truth. Having Rodney stay was an impossible dream, and he was afraid if he opened his eyes, that Rodney would leave him with the painful memory of seeing pity in his eyes.

But, then again, Rodney had kissed _him._

“John, open your eyes,” he murmured, and he caved far too easily. When he opened them, he saw Rodney standing there, not having moved a muscle, a faint smile on the corner of his lips. And then he said, “We are the biggest idiots I have ever met,” and John simply swallowed, unsure of what to say to that, and then he asked him, “Why did you lie to me, John?” At seeing John’s confused expression, he clarified, “The last time we danced, I asked you to give me a reason…and you didn’t say anything. Your silence told me that you cared about me, but not enough to say anything to make me stay.”

Immediately, John found the words that he didn’t know he had and shot back at him, “I could never do that to you, Rodney. I could never make you choose between a future that was certain and one that might never even work.” He gestured between the two of them and added, “I’m not someone who gives people ultimatums. I would never do that to you.”

At that, he looked annoyed, and his tone was almost bitter as he bit out in response to John’s explanation, “You could never make me _choose?_ My god, Sheppard, you never gave me the chance to _have_ a choice! How selfish is that?”

He had no idea what to say to that. He’d never thought of it that way.

Rodney continued to rant.

“I mean, we’ve been friends for, what…seven years, now? Seven years!” he shouted, and then waved his hand for emphasis. “In that time we have saved each other’s lives I don’t know how many times, and I’ve lost count of all the time that we spend together in our off hours, because you’re the only person that I’ve ever felt that I don’t have to censor myself for! Do you know what that’s like, John?” he asked, almost pleadingly. “Do you know what it’s like to constantly have to watch what you say or do around everyone all the time for fear of being shunned? You are the only person in my life who _accepts_ that part of me, and for me that is _terrifying._ It makes me feel…”

His voice drifted, but John knew the word he was looking for, and softly said, “Seen.”

Rodney nodded.

“Exactly. Now, what does it say about us that I can be myself with you, but not with the woman that I’m about to marry?”

John was, again, at a loss for words. He wasn’t good at emotions, let alone putting words to them. The sound of the breakwater echoed in the awkward silence between them, and he found himself licking his lips and shivered slightly when he realized that he could still taste Rodney on them.

Apparently, John’s lack of answer was annoying Rodney because he suddenly burst out, “Goddammit, say something! Say anything, John! Tell me to go back to my fiancé, to leave Atlantis and never come back, to--to…”

His voice faded, and then John’s stoicism finally snapped.

“What the hell do you want me to say, Rodney?! That it kills me to see the way you act when you’re around her? That every time I hear her talk about you, it makes me sick to my stomach? That whenever I’m in the same room as you, it’s next to impossible to keep my eyes off of you? God,” he said, exasperated, and feeling as wrung out as a sponge. And then he saw the look on Rodney’s face, the hopeful look in his eyes, and he knew he had to say the rest.

“I’m in love with you.”

Feeling weary, the words fell from his lips effortlessly, as if he’d said them a million times before, none of the anger he thought that would be behind them the first time he said it.

And all Rodney asked was, “When?”

John snorted at his reaction and answered, “Oh, all the way back when you first saved me. When that damn bug infected me,” he admitted, and he saw Rodney’s eyes widen, so he had to ask, “What about you? When did you know how you felt about me?”

Rodney gave him a look, but then reluctantly admitted, “Back when you saved me,” and John couldn’t help but quip, “Which time?” and Rodney rolled his eyes, but John knew exactly which time he was talking about without ever having to say it. He gave him a look and then prompted him, “Do you mean the time…with your memory…you know,” he lamely finished and Rodney nodded and then reached out and grasped John’s hand, and said, “Yeah. That one. Sorry about that,” he apologized. “Took me a bit longer to figure it all out and what it all meant, you know?”

John nodded back at him, squeezed his hand, and then said, “So…this is great and all, but don’t you have a rehearsal dinner to get back to?” and Rodney groaned.

“Oh, god, don’t remind me. This is _not_ going to pretty, let me tell you that much,” he balefully intoned, and John gave him a look in return. “Already had the rehearsal dinner and the wedding reception in one, and now I’m going to have to…god, I can’t even say it. I am total coward.”

John grinned right back at him, feeling a faint surge of hope in his chest, but then said, “Look, I already broke up my own marriage, and so I’m not particularly proud of the fact that I’m breaking up a marriage before it even started. I mean, Rodney, if you’re _really_ in love with her…don’t let my feelings for you hold you back,” and the scientist looked at him as if he’d suddenly grown a second head, and then said, sounding thoroughly annoyed, “Oh, god, you’re stupid, aren’t you? I just admitted to you that I’m in love with you, too, and the first thing you do is freak out over breaking up a relationship that was doomed to fail, anyway! An idiot,” he muttered under his breath, “I fell in love with an idiot.”

Before John could say another word, Rodney leaned back in and pressed another soft kiss to his lips, taking him off guard a second time. As he pulled back, he smiled and said, “You know, something you said to me a while back has stuck with me. You told me the secret to dancing was knowing all the steps before you added the music.”

John nodded, still not sure what to say.

“Well, with Jennifer, I feel that we had the music and that the two of us have always been stumbling with the steps, making it up as we went along, saying that we meant to do it that way and that’s how it’s supposed to look, but with you…” His voice drifted a moment, and his eyes wandered over John’s face. “…With you, I feel like we’ve known the steps ever since the beginning. We just weren’t ready to add the music until now.”

John swallowed, feeling a surge of emotion in the back of his throat, and then leaned in and rested his forehead once more against Rodney’s.

They stood that way for a long time. Leaning against each other, breathing each other in, listening to the breakwater far down below them, their breath and the ocean the only sounds. John drank it in, savoring the moment, and then Rodney squeezed his hand and slowly pulled away.

Just before he turned to leave, he tossed over his shoulder, “See you in the morning, John.”

Yeah. He’d see him in the morning.

\--

For the first time in a long time, John ignored his alarm, lying in bed, disregarding the bright red numbers on his bedside table that said it was nearly eleven in the morning. He’d woken up a couple of hours before but had decided that it wasn’t time for him to get up. Today was a rest day, anyway, so he would take advantage of the time he had. Word had gone out on the comms early that morning that the wedding was cancelled, but that was all John knew. Rodney hadn’t contacted him all morning.

Everything about the night before felt…surreal. He still wasn’t entirely sure that it had happened.

Suddenly, there was a buzz at his door, and he reluctantly dragged himself from his bed and over to the door. It slid open to reveal Dr. Biro, and John was incredibly confused.

“Uh, Dr. Biro,” he said, reaching up and trying to smooth down his hair, feeling slightly self-conscious in just his boxers and a t-shirt, having been expecting someone else all morning. “Not that it isn’t nice to see you, but…what exactly are you doing here?”

She shot him a smug grin, and then he saw that she had a garment bag slung over her shoulder.

“This is for you,” she said handing it over to him and John immediately recognized it. It was his tuxedo. Before he could ask, she said, “Dr. McKay told me to make sure that you were dressed and ready in the next twenty minutes, so I’ll be right out here, waiting for you. Oh, and Ronon told me to remind you that Spencer and Burton need to be reassigned.”

John let out a groan and said as he took the bag, “Don’t tell me they’re in the infirmary, again,” and she nodded and answered, “Yep. Dr. Andrews is having to reset two dislocated shoulders,” but before he could ask anything more, she turned around and shut the door in his face, leaving him still confused as to why Rodney wanted him to wear the tux, but he did as requested. Exactly twenty minutes later, he was showered and dressed, though his hair still wouldn’t behave.

As soon as he stepped outside his quarters, Dr. Biro shot him a bright smile and said, sounding all too chirpy, “Follow me.”

He walked behind her, feeling conspicuous in a tux, but no one else seemed to be out, and so his tension eased when they didn’t run into anyone as they walked to wherever she was leading him to.

John was startled when he saw her leading him to the balcony that he’d just been on the night before with Rodney, wondering what kind of stunt he was trying to pull, but then lost his breath when he saw Rodney standing out there wearing his own tuxedo, bis broad shoulders cutting a striking profile on midday sky behind him.

“You made it,” he said, stepping towards him and John finally said, “Yeah, but I’m still not sure what’s going on here, McKay…what are you doing?”

He heard the bio scientist close the door behind them as Rodney replied, with that egotistical smirk of his, “Well, before I answer that, it might amuse you to find out that apparently most of Atlantis had a hunch that the wedding was going to be called off all because a little birdie happened to spread the rumor that you were teaching me to dance…”

John growled under his breath.

“Teyla.”

Rodney nodded.

“Yep,” he said popping the word on his lips. “And because of that, it meant that my talk with Jennifer went more smoothly than expected.” Before John could ask, he answered, “She already left, John. The Daedalus was ahead of schedule and she was on it first thing this morning, and we got Dr. Andrews in her place. He’s at the top of his field, though he is still a doctor, so that’s not really saying much,” he said in the usual dismissive way that he talked about those in the field of medicine.

He then reached around him and tugged him in by his waist and said, “Now, because of that, I feel that I owe you a dance.” He pulled out a small remote and pressed a button on it, and John could hear music playing from some sort of hidden speakers.

It was Johnny Cash.

He grinned at Rodney and leaned into him as he started to lead him around the small balcony, and said, “You know, because you’re staying, there’s no need for me to teach a class,” and Rodney rolled his eyes and snarked back at him, “Oh, please. You? Teach? I’ve seen you teach. It’s a good thing I decided to stay here with you, you know.”

John chuckled and pressed himself even closer to the scientist, pleased that he didn’t have to hide it anymore. It was small, but it was so freeing. He began to hum along with the song and then brought them close enough together so he could rest his temple against Rodney’s, hearing the sound of the waves against the side of the city, a beautiful counterpoint to the music that they swayed along to. It wasn’t really a waltz, but it didn’t matter.

They already knew the steps.


End file.
